I have spent the last two days birding. The woods are still fairly quiet but things are picking up. Yellow-rumped Warblers started to appear as of Thursday. I saw 49 species in total but it wasn't the numbers that impressed me but rather what happened yesterday.
I've often mentioned East Point in my ramblings on here and here I go again.
East Point sticks out from the tip of the Island. It divides Northumberland Strait from the Gulf of St Lawrence and points like a dagger at Cape Breton.
As soon as I turned on to Lighthouse Rd I saw raptors circling above the fields. They would soar then drop behind the trees then re-appear. sometimes one would chase another one. I identified Osprey, Red-tailed Hawk, Broad-winged, Northern Harrier and Northern Goshawk. A couple of years ago, in the exactly the same location, I watched hawks towering as they prepared to glide other to the mainland in their fall migration. Today it was the opposite, these birds were new arrivals.
I drove the kilometer or so to the tip of the point and parked there for about 3 hours, for the most part just sitting scoping the sea. There were 5 very white gulls on the rocks below and after some debate (Iceland vs Glaucous) I decided on Glaucous. The reason for my hesitation is that Glaucous are quite rare here and to see 5 like that was wild. Eventually I counted nine of them.
At one point I walked along the cliff top and flushed 13 Great Blue Herons who were resting on the clifftop or on the rocks below. Obviously more birds who had just arrived and were taking a break on the first land they found.
American Kestrels were flying in off of the water at regular intervals the whole time that I was there, even three Merlins showed up. They would fly in and drop into the scrubby trees behind the lighthouse. When I left the Point I saw a Kestrel on the phone wires every couple of hundred yards for a of mile or so.
Nothern Gannets were flying by in short lines of two or three and the Great Cormorants were there in good numbers (there's a nesting colony at the Point). Surf Scoters, Common Eider and a few Long-tailed ducks were off-shore.
Add all this to the fact that it was a the best weather we've had since last summer (20+C, bright sun) and, as it was the setting day for the start of the spring lobster season, there were dozens of lobster boats offshore and you will understand what a marvellous day it was. :bounce:
