FOR THE BIRDS

MARCH 2000

By

Helen O'Shea

At My Feeders

A male Common Redpoll appeared on February 27 and on March 1, four American Goldfinch arrived. The males - our wild canaries - are becoming a much brighter yellow and the black cap is more evident. Three Blue Jays arrived March 1st just after I refilled the feeder. It didn’t take them long to sift through the contents for pieces of peanut and shelled sunflower seed. A pair of Red-breasted Nuthatch arrive daily. The male has a very distinct brick-coloured chest. On March 4, a Canada Jay landed in the tree, looked in the kitchen window and flew away.

Pheasant Facts

Donald John Cameron loaned me a photo that he took of the male Ring-necked Pheasant standing beside an American Crow. The pheasant visits his yard almost daily. On Leap Day, Darryl Peck saw the male Ring-necked Pheasant crossing Main Street between Gary Peck’s yard and the Gerrat Brook Barachois. The week before, Jennifer Gledhill reported a pair of Pheasants flying across Main Street in the same location. Gary said that he heard a Pheasant call while he was walking near the Visitor Centre on March 1^st. Kevin Donovan saw a male Pheasant when he looked out his window on Upper Kent Street. They’re all around us.

Did you know that a Crow weighs approximately 1.5 pounds while a male Ring-necked Pheasant has an average weight of 2.7 pounds? Pheasants leave the roost about daybreak and begin feeding about an hour after sunrise. They eat mostly plant foods, largely waste corn, wheat, barley, oats, weed seed, acorns, pine seeds and wild berries. They eat green plant foods in spring, and cutworms, grasshoppers, crickets, potato beetles and caterpillars, mice and snails. They will come to feeding stations for corn or small grains spread on the ground. They usually make their nest on the ground in a natural depression or a shallow one scratched out by the female. It is lined with bits of grasses or weeds. John K. Terres, The Audubon Society Encyclopedia of North American Birds.  

Other Town and Area Sightings

Harvey and Mona MacLeod of Catalone saw a male Pileated Woodpecker on a power pole near their home on February 25. Despite hanging a pole with holes filled with suet in their yard for the past two years, it was their first sighting of this magnificent bird, or any other woodpecker. Our sunny, 16 degree Monday, February 28, was a great day for woodpecker sightings. I saw a male Black-backed Three-toed Woodpecker drumming on a utility pole near Morrison Road. Thank heavens no one was following me and I could pull off to the shoulder and observe his performance. Just past Catalone there was a male Hairy Woodpecker that flew to a utility pole at the roadside and landed to forage for food. The flight of a woodpecker is unique (graceful and bounding is one description in Audubon), and once recognized, you can track the bird.

Norman Day told Bill about a flock of 25 to 30 Bohemian Waxwings that have come to his yard to eat the apples of a flowering crabapple tree. He has about 7 there on a regular basis. Sylvia and Joe Trimm had a small flock of these birds in their ornamental tree on the front lawn March 3. Donald and Margie Cameron had two Canada Jays at their feeder on March 5.

Richard Knapton has an Ipswich Sparrow that comes to his feeder in the cold weather. He also has a pair of White-winged Crossbills. He has seen the Black-backed Three-toed Woodpecker on Havenside Road, as have Mary Marsden and Jean Pearl on their morning walks.

Around the Harbour

The little silver fish continue to run. You know it’s busy out there from the mobs of up to 150 Red-breasted Mergansers fishing. The group of 6 to 9 Common Loons is still here. Driving by the Havenside Barachois on Leap Day I wondered if the Ruddy Turnstone and Black-bellied Plover will return to that area now that the beach has been disturbed.

Driving around the harbour on February 27 we saw 3 pair of Buffleheads, 10 American Crows, 31 American Black Ducks, and 80 to 90 Gulls - Great Black-backed, Herring and Iceland - in the Gerrat’s Brook Barachois. George MacMullin told us that he watches the ducks as they move more toward the harbour or near the rocks closer to Main Street. It all depends on the ice conditions. At Point of View, Tom Kennedy reported that 2 mature Bald Eagles had been near the gazebo the day before as had 8 Canada Geese. We watched the geese through binoculars that same day on the grassy slope beside the Dauphin Gate at the entrance to the Fortress. Gary Peck said they are sometimes at the Visitor Centre and Mary Kennedy saw them at the old Stella Maris graveyard. On March 4 and 5, there were 10 Canada Geese at the Fortress between the fisherman’s house and the gate.

On February 27, the mother lode of birds was off LeMoines’ wharf where they were unloading fish. There were approximately 50 Gulls – Great Black-backed, Herring and Iceland - squabbling over fish carcasses. A mature Bald Eagle was flew around with a fish in its talons. Fifty Red-breasted Mergansers were fishing off Carters’ wharf, and about the same number were fishing off the Jackie deVries’ wharf. A lone male Bufflehead was in Scott’s Cove below Doug Pearl’s. Female Red-breasted Mergansers outnumber the males by more than three to one.

Doug Pearl was in Gabarus on February 21 where he saw more than 150 Red-breasted Mergansers and 7 Common Loons. From the lighthouse, on March 5, I spotted a Great Cormorant flying towards Green Island. The white flank patch stood out clearly as it flew.

Red-throated Loon

On February 12, Cathy and Allan Murrant, Susann Myers and Cory Chezenko were at the Government Wharf on part of their birding expedition throughout the area. They mentioned the Red-throated Loon that was off the boat launch near the signal mast. We watched it in that area and also fishing off the wharf below the home of John Wilcox. They mentioned that there was a female Northern Pintail Duck at Renwick Brook in Glace Bay. The next day we drove over armed with a bag of bread scraps and a bag of mixed bird seed. I have never seen so many birds in one spot. We saw more than 40 Lesser Scaup, 50 Long-tailed Ducks, 40 Buffleheads, 150 Mallards, 6 Common Goldeneye and more than 150 Black Ducks. The female Pintail circled with the rest of the Mallards and Black Ducks on the bridge at Bill’s feet as he tossed the feed. She was within 5 feet of us for 10 minutes. Nearby we also saw a dozen Black-headed Gulls and a Cormorant. Louisbourg is not the only location for the lone Cormorant.

Spring Cleaning

It is time to rake up the old seed on the ground and scrub out your feeders. Chuck out the old nesting materials from the bird houses and prepare to welcome the new arrivals. Ella Blagdon reports an interested House Sparrow eyeing the bird house. She wonders if it is the same one who nested in her yard last year.

Call me with your sightings at 733-2873.

Helen O’Shea

Extracted from © The Seagull, Helen O'Shea, For the Birds

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