New Years Bird Count

 A family tradition when I was growing up was for my god parents to visit every new years. Early new years day we would wake up and pile into a van. We'd drive around and walk around counting as many birds as we could find. Person who found the most got candy!

 I have grown up a lot since then and now bird for fun on my own time without the pushing and probings of parents or bribery of candy. So when given the opportunity to visit my god parents in their newly bought retirement cottage in Prince Edward County I couldn't resist.  We were going to do the New Years bird count but due to changes in schedules we ended up doing this on New Year Eve rather than Day. It was fine by me!

Chris and I were the first two awake quickly followed by my dad. The feeder had many common redpolls, house sparrows, house finches, chickadees and juncos already visiting it. A few blue jays, cardinals and mourning doves were around the garden as well.

Common Redpoll

 Our first drive around we saw a few Red-tailed hawks, American tree sparrows, American Crows, more Common Redpolls and Blue Jays, European Starlings and Rock Pigeons. Then a small flock of about 8 or more birds is feeding on someones driveway probably picking up salt or grit. This is a bird I don't recognize at all and after heated debate and many flips through bird books and iphones we all agree that it is a Lapland Longspur.

Lapland Longspur

After our quick drive around we went back to the house for breakfast and to pick up the others who got to sleep till a normal hour. The memories of this tradition were much more intense when I was a child... It was always cold and we ALL had to wake up very very early.  But apparently the birds weren't early risers either and even more things were out than before. Just one the property we saw Downy and Red-bellied Woodpeckers. A Coopers hawk flew over probably scoping out the mourning doves.

Driving the same route as earlier we found Horned Larks, Snow Buntings, American Kestrel and Northern Harrier.

Horned Lark

 Returning to the site where the small flock of Lapland Longspurs were there was a single Longspur and a Sparrow feasting on some bare areas of ground.

Lapland Longspur and Song Sparrow

The dock in town was quite active since a lot of the surrounding area had frozen and it was one of the only areas of open water in the sheltered bay. Here were Mallards, Canada Goose, Common Merganser, Common Goldeneye, American Black Duck, Mute Swan, Tundra Swan, Bufflehead and Long-tailed Ducks. The only birds flying above the water were Ring-billed Gulls and Herring Gulls.

Long tailed Duck

Bufflehead males and female

Swans

 We drove around a lot that day looking for more birds. I have almost lost track of where we went (not that I really knew to begin with since I was a passenger in the back and my eyes were out for birds). There were more snow buntings, more harriers and red-tails, another Coopers Hawk, A northern shrike and then came what would be one of our best birds of the day.... long pause... (it's hard to believe this would ever be considered our best bird...)...  A lonely and cold hermit thrush. This is not really a great bird for Ontario or for Prince Edward County but it is a GOOD WINTER BIRD... If you are a lister (which I do not consider myself personally but I do keep a life list and report on ebird since I think it's a good way to report data so people can use it for science-I DIGRESS!) then you would probably have a backyard list, county list, ontario list, canada list, north american list, and a life list all pretty self explanatory right. The winter list is a seasonal list which I have never heard of before this year but people consider the winter season another excuse to keep another list. Since many common birds become rarities in the winter it makes this little cold hermit thrush a GOOD bird.

Hermit Thrush

A few days prior there was no snow and now this bird is living in a winter wonderland. Needless to say this bird probably wont be in the area long after we saw it since it appeared to have been forced to scavenge in leaf litter upturned by the snow plows.