Tag Archives: Kildonan Park

Excitement in Bird World

It has been quite the day in Bird World. It started out with gorgeous weather on the Canadian Prairies and my hunt for Wood Ducks. Were they still here? Yes, they were! There was only a pair at Kildonan Park but what cuties they were. I almost didn’t see them at first. They were both standing on a log back in a hollow with an overhang. I have so fallen in love with Wood Ducks the last six months.

The last time I visited the duck area of Kildonan Park, there had to be three dozen in the stream near the Witch’s Hut but, not today. I walked up and down the shore, down close to the water, and well, they had to be hidden really well if they were there.

This time it was also easy to count the Mallards. 25 in total. Each of the Mallards were busy either preening or dabbling for food. I thought I would give you a view different perspectives for a couple of the males. Their plumage is simply gorgeous.

In the image below, I love the soft feathers on the chest in contrast with the two white borders of that deep navy. Look at the curls on the tail and the horizontals on the chest. Stunning.

This is a great example of how waterproof their feathers actually are.

There were about 350 Canada Geese at various locations. Some were feeding on the grass, others were in the water. None of them liked the people walking their dogs.

Today was a problem because I wanted to get back and hear the updates and discussion about Grinnell, the injured falcon from UC-Berkeley. Sadly, I did not have as much patience with a little Red Squirrel that seemed to not like my taking photos of the ducks. It chattered away the whole time. Perhaps it wanted its picture taken? I decided that it didn’t because it would not give me one of those cute squirrel poses everyone else seems to capture. This little one was determined to hide behind that branch!

Oh, it screeched at me til I got out of sight! My phone told me that I had a little over an hour. Would it be possible to check on the duck pond closer to where I live? Were there any Wood Ducks there?

I scoured Duck Island at St Vital Park, walked the entire perimeter of the pond, and could only find three Wood Ducks – 2 females and a male in Eclipse plumage (the one in the middle). All of the others were gone.

There were not nearly the number of Mallards or Canada Geese despite the wide open soccer and cricket areas where they can feed.

It seems that the cooler weather a few days ago really did get many to head South. It will be nice when April comes and we can hear them honking overhead. I can’t wait.

I have reported on the update on Grinnell earlier today. You can read about it here and there is a link to the live event in my blog:

https://wordpress.com/post/maryannsteggles.com/27983

At this point it felt like the day was almost over and I had yet to check on the ‘regulars’ – the PLO osplets set to be banded on 8 November, the 367 Collins Street Four, and Yurruga, the Peregrine Falcon nestling at Orange.

The first was little Yurruga. I think I will stop using the adjective ‘little’. Yurruga is growing and changing. She is really beginning to loose that fluffy down revealing her juvenile feathers. Despite the fact that Yurruga has had short bouts of self-feeding, today was a bit of a surprise. I captured it for you in a short video.

Several hours later, Diamond came into the scrape and fed Yurruga the remaining portion of the Starling.

What wonderful training. Yurruga worked and worked on that prey item until she was tired. She did well. Mum knew to give her time and then come in and feed her little one. These are incredible parents. I also want to add that Diamond is walking much better! Her injury is healing.

Wow. Could it get any better? Well, I don’t know if it is better or not but I can say that the three osplets at Port Lincoln are even civil when wing flapping. They take turns! That said, I just about fell out of my chair watching them. Little Bob is flapping first. The trio are to be ringed on Monday, measured, given names, and at least one will have a sat-pak attached to its back. I just hope they are still on the nest! Can you imagine planning for that and they have literally flown the nest? It could happen!

Little Bob really wants to fly.

I am not certain which of the other siblings is featured in this clip testing out its wings. Mum is feeding – it sure doesn’t take long now to consume an entire fish! What a change from six weeks ago. Little Bob is on the right and unknown sibling on the left eating.

They take turns.

All three are getting some air. Oh, my. I was almost afraid to check on the 367 Collins Street Four for fear they had all fledged while I was away or doing other things. Relief. All four were on the ledge a few hours ago.

These are bittersweet moments. Fledge can happen at any time. At least one of them is more than ready. In an interview today, Victor Hurley, the lead researcher of Peregrine Falcons in Victoria, says he believes that there are 2 females and 2 males this year. How lovely!

It has been an exciting day with more to come in the next week. There will be fledges in Melbourne and Port Lincoln for sure.

Thank you for joining me today. Take care everyone.

Thank you to the following for their streaming cams where I took my screen shots and video clips: the Port Lincoln Osprey Project, 367 Collins Street Falcons by Mirvac, Charles Sturt University Falcon Cam and Cilla Kinross.

Gorgeous day for birding

It is a gorgeous day today. 24 degrees C. We still, for at least today, have summer weather. This meant seeing new and old friends today at the park. There were at least 12 male Wood Ducks, as many females, a host of female and a few male Mallards, and, of course, Canada Geese.

This adult male Wood Duck with its distinctive red eye and green helmet thought that I might have some seed for him to eat. He did not seem to want to take ‘sorry’ as a proper answer.

The duck below is all wet from diving around in the park stream.

Their plumage is absolutely outrageously gorgeous.

There were a few adult female Wood Ducks but not nearly as many as the males at Kildonan Park today. Because there are issues with identification between the juveniles and those in eclipse, I have come upon a bit of a foolproof method for me. The duck below is an adult female Wood Duck. She lacks the red iris and eye ring of the adult male; she does have a yellow eye ring and a distinctive white eye patch. Her bill is dark. I do not want the iridescent green on the top of the head to fool me. This bird is lacking in the 2 pale lines from the throat extending around the neck and onto the cheek. To see those, look at the images of the adult male.

There were a number of Mallards, both male and female.

All of the animals were having a wonderful morning around the duck pond. There were many who brought specialty bird seed just for them. Others, like this little Red Squirrel, were finding acorns and seeds in the grass.

As I was sorting through these images to show to you, there were several knocks on the front door. Several times I went out and no one was there. There are times that sounds carry but, then the knocking got louder and louder. This time I caught the visitor! My house is covered with cedar shakes. It looks more like a cottage in a forest but there is someone who loves those cedar shakes. When I opened the door he flew to the apple tree.

Unfortunately the automatic focus set its mind on the leaves and not on the woodpecker! And she was not certain that he wanted his picture taken or not.

I say ‘she’ because that gorgeous read crest would extended all the way down to the bak if this were the male. But, it is not, it is a female.

You can see that its body is mostly covered in black feathers with a flaming red crest. There is a white throat and its beak is a long dagger shape sadly hidden by the leaves. This particular Pileated Woodpecker lives around my garden year round (and the neighbour hood). She will make her nest in the cavity of a dead or dying tree lining it with wood chips. When she is knocking on my cedar shakes she is looking for ants, wood-boring beetles, and insect larvae. She also likes berries and nuts and I have seen her on the large suet cylinder as well as the telephone pole drilling away. The woodpeckers particularly like the bug and nut suet if you are trying to attract them.

I am particularly concerned for both this Pileated Woodpecker and the male and female Downy that live around my garden. My city has sprayed orange dots on two of the 119 year old Maple Trees in front of my house on the boulevard. If they are to cut them down, is one or both the home and nest of the woodpeckers?

The Grey Slated Juncos are still here today along with a few White Throated Sparrows and Song Sparrows.

It is easy to tell the White-throated Sparrow because of that distinctive white patch under the beak forming the throat – hence, the name. There are also two black bands and three white on the crown along with two very distinctive yellow patches above the eye. The White-throated Sparrows come to Manitoba to breed during the summer. By the end of the month, all of them will be gone to their winter homes.

The Song Sparrow comes to Manitoba also for summer breeding. Soon they will also be away on their journey south. For now, a few are in the garden scratching around the grass and leaves for insects and bug larvae. They are beautiful with that plumage of rust and grey with streaks of white.

It has been a lovely day. I have it on good authority that all of the nestling falcons are fine as are the osplets at Port Lincoln. Yesterday, they once again had 7 feedings! Speaking of feedings, the list of what Mum and Dad have brought in for the Collins Four is anything other than 99% pigeon. This year they have averaged 7.4 prey items per day with 3 being the lowest number of deliveries and 11 being the highest. They have had pigeon, New Holland Honeyeater, Rainbow Lorikeets, Quail, Silver-eyed Gulls, Sparrows, Spotted Pardalotes, Starlings, Wattlebirds, and a White plumed honeyeater. This is quite the surprise. Normally the urban falcons exist primarily on pigeon. I wonder if the people in Melbourne are no longer feeding the pigeons so that the falcons have to look to other species? In Orange, the diet is varied with lots of parrots and Starlings.

A late delivery yesterday was a green parrot. I do not specifically recognize the ‘type’ but will try to find out.

The only streaming cam I have not checked on today is the one for the White-bellied Sea Eagles. Indeed, WBSE 27 was jumping all over the tree and it or both might have fledged. I will alert you if this is the case.

Thank you for joining me. I hope you enjoyed the ducks! Take care. See you soon.

Thank you to the Collins Street Falcon Cam by Mirvac where I took my screen shot of the delivery of the green parrot.

Everything is good in Bird World. 17 October 2021

It was 19 or 20 degrees C, depending on which weather station you listened to, on the Canadian Prairies this afternoon. Those temperatures are traditional summer ones, not middle of October! As a result, my foray to photograph Wood Ducks went sideways. It was a beautiful Sunday and everyone was outside in their summer clothes with bikes or skateboards, picnic lunches or books or both.

“Kildonan Park” by RWTurenne is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

I do not blame them but, it was impossible to get near the ducks and the Canada Geese in the pond near the Witches’ Cottage in Kildonan Park.

“Kildonan Park” by Travy is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

We may get our first frost on Wednesday evening but until then the days are going to be brilliant. No doubt those ducks will still be around awhile longer.

“Lots of Ducks” by theclyde is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

There was a small altercation at the Port Lincoln Osprey barge around 09:24. It is unclear what got into Middle Bob but he had a bee in his bonnet and decided he wanted to take it out on Little Bob. The skirmish lasted three eyelid blinks and it was over. And it did not put Little Bob off in the slightest. He was up front and ready to eat when the next fish was delivered at 12:16:01. Indeed, there had been two fish deliveries and feedings already – at 6:34:35 and another at 8:21:17. All of the chicks have been preening feverishly. Wonder if it is the itch from the feathers that is making Middle Bob out of sorts?

The juvenile feathers are really coming in and depending on the way the light hits the nest you can hardly find the chicks.

Little Bob is up at Mum’s beak with Middle Bob to its right. Big Bob is facing off the nest and has a rather robust tummy and crop.

No one seems to have moved. Little Bob is eating first. Anything Middle Bob have done to try and intimidate him has not worked. I am just going to put it down to Middle Bob waking up on the wrong side of the nest! If Little Bob turns out like Tiny Tot Tumbles from the Achieva Nest, Middle Bob will wish he had not been naughty.

It was a nice sized fish – not a whopper – but, it topped the kids off, all of them. In six hours, three fish. Pretty good, Dad!

That is Little Bob in the middle showing his nice crop in the image below. Look at how the tail is growing on the chick to the right.

Little Bob is 32 days old today. That makes Big and Middle 34 days or if you count the other method – Big is 34, Middle is 33, and Little is 32. There is 51 hours between the time Big and Little hatched. That surely has had a strong impact on the peacefulness of this nest, this year.

There were some very tender moments between Diamond and her baby yesterday evening in the scrape box at Orange. Here is one of those.

What a difference it makes when the chick’s eyes are fully open and they can see their parent and that food coming in that big beak. This chick is 9 days old. Just imagine. A week ago it was hardly bigger than one of those eggs. It is healthy and strong.

One but, probably both, of the White Bellied Sea Eagles is going to fledge really soon. They can hardly contain their wings from flapping and their legs from jumping. Typically, fledges occur in the morning or evening. Keep your eyes open for news from this nest in the Sydney Olympic Forest.

For those of you following the Royal Cam Chick, Tiaki, this season, there were a few tense days when her sat-pak was not plotting her GPS. Today it began working – possibly due to needing to be charged -. She is well past the International Date Line on her way to the waters of Chile. That was such a relief for everyone. When those GPS units quit working everyone fears the worst.

Last year’s favourite Albatross, OGK, Pippa Atawhai’s Dad, has been in and out at Taiaroa Head waiting for the arrival of YRK, his mate. Oh, I hope she arrives soon!

Lady Hawk posted a video showing Tiaki’s location and OGK having to defend his territory.

Apparently, OGK left and the two love birds spent the night on a spot near to Pippa Atawhai’s nest.

First feeding for the 367 Collins Street Four in Melbourne. Everyone has a nice polished crop and that scrape box sure needs a good wind to hit it! They are soooooo big. Three seemed a lot to handle last year with those big females but imagine when they are ready to fledge. These parents are going to deserve a really good rest.

They were the stars of one of ABC’s breakfast television shows yesterday. Melbourne sure loves their falcon family! They also included Diamond and Xavier from Orange. It was wonderful that the Peregrine Falcons made it into the last round of voting for Australia’s Bird of the Year. Maybe next year!

One of the most interesting prey items was a quail that Dad brought in. Everyone is wondering where he found it. I mean, seriously, where do you expect to find a quail in a large city? the zoo?

What a wonderful way to end the day – all of the birds are fed and well taken care of. Life really is good on the nests. We are so very fortunate to be able to watch their lives.

Thank you so much for joining me. I hope to have some good images of the Wood Ducks this week. Take care. See you soon.

Thank you to the following for their streaming cam where I took my screen captures: Sea Eagle Cam @Birdlife Australia Discovery Center, 367 Collins Street Falcons by Mirvac, Charles Sturt University Falcon Cam at Orange and Cilla Kinross, and the Port Lincoln Osprey Project.