Stéphane’s Posting for August 28, 2011

One Owl, One New Species, and One Hurricane!

On Saturday, August 27, at the break of dawn, we got a nice little surprise in our nets: a Northern Saw-whet Owl! It was the only bird captured during this first net check at 6:30 AM. It was a young bird, with the telltale brown chocolate of the head. Such a cute and amazing little bird, not 15 cm from tail tip to head!

During census on that same day, 5 shorebirds took off from the beach and flew fast away over Georgian Bay; they were Ruddy Turnstones, the first time this species is observed at Cabot Head!

Today, August 28, we felt the edge of the hurricane Irene: we had strong North-East wind all morning with the eastern half of the sky filled with high-altitude cirrus. As a consequence or not, there were barely any birds around: Only 9 species were detected during census and 10 birds were captured!

Stéphane