The Sandpiper-Plover: Shorebirding in the High Andes.

Starting backwards on reporting on my 16 day trip  Southern Ocean cruise, here are some snaps from the end of the adventure. 

With somewhat vague directions embedded on  Richard Crossley's cell phone we were not exactly sure  where to look for the Diademed Sandpiper-Plover after we left Santiago, Chile. We drove up and up and up into the clear blue dawn sky, on roads sometimes carved into steep mountainsides where avalanche warnings were prevalent. There were lots of interesting birds in the arid scrub. Wish I could find the Guide to Birds of Chile  that Holly Hogan lent me to look them up, as the  memory of some of the birds are getting vague, but most I photographed for identification later. The road eventually ran out and you are forced to look for the hint of a track across vast gravel flats and a meandering river which was just passable with a car.

Yah - it took some time and effort on foot at 12,000+ ft elevation without finding our target. Time was not on our side. We had to give up.  On the drive out of the valley we looked back on where we had just been and realize there was a green patch in the arid landscape that we had not noticed.  That had to be the location. We turned around for one last shot. But there were no sandpiper-plovers in this last green spot either. We were out of time and options. With airports on out minds we turned the car around but saw a van load of birders with their scopes out looking at something in the drainage stream from the hot springs. It was a Wings Inc birding tour. They were on a Diademed Sandpiper-Plover at the very spot we had driven through in the car!! Our limited knowledge of the species told us to expect this bizarre species in the green oasis caused by springs pouring out of the mountain sides. Ah -such are the bonuses of local help.

The habitat. Lush green patches of green are an oasis among the vast gray arid scenes of the Chilean Andes.  This what the Diademed Sandpiper-Plover nests in. 

The first view. At first we though there was just one bird but in fact it was a family group of two adults and two chicks.

The ugly duckling of shorebird chicks, this precious chick ensures the continuation of the species.

Among shorebird clan, the Diademed Sandpiper- Plover is a unique bird.

Hermit Warbler Attempts Wintering in Newfoundland

As outrageous as that sounds, it is fact.  On 7 December Alison Mews and Ethel Dempsey found a Hermit Warbler in St. John's, Newfoundland on the site of the former school for the deaf on Topsail Road. The groves of imported jack pines seemed an ideal pocket of habitat for this western warbler. It was difficult to locate among the pines over the following days but most searchers eventually got their views.  Alison put out a home made suet/peanut butter blog in the pines in the hopes that it would find it. IT WORKED! On the 17 December Hermit Warbler was observed feeding on the suet block along with juncos and Boreal Chickadees. 

The rest is history up to the date of this writing on 7 Jan 2020.  The HEWA is visiting the now several suet  blocks put up for the bird daily.  There is lots of snow. Between Christmas Eve and 7 Jan 100 cm of snow has fallen on St. John's with 69 cm depth of snow currently on the ground. But the temperatures have been relatively mild hovering in the -3C to +1C range.  The Hermit Warbler looks reasonably healthy.  Its plumage is looking less sleek and more ruffled if not a little puffed out.  It sometimes looks wet around the face. Perhaps a combination of the greasy food source and the wet pines.  Will it survive until spring?  It would be a miracle for a species that rarely experiences below freezing temperature or ever sees snow.  It should be in a Central American pine forest in January.

This represents the fourth record of Hermit Warbler for the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

1. Blackhead, Avalon Peninsula, 11-13 November 1989
2. Mobile, Avalon Peninsula, 11 November to 1 December 2016
3. Cape Broyle, Avalon Peninsula, 23 October 2017
4. St. John's, Avalon Peninsula, 7 December 2019 to present 7 January 2020

It should be noted the fall of 2019 saw an unprecedented influx of Townsend's Warblers to the Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland. There was a staggering total of 18 different individual Townsend's discovered (all photographed).  Most were discovered during November but the earliest was on 23 September. Whether this was related to the occurrence of the Hermit Warbler is not known.

The Hermit Warbler on 7 December -  the day of discovery. A fleeting encounter with a healthy chipper looking warbler. An intensely exciting photo capture moment.  At the time we did not know it was going to become the town pet.

These three pictures above from 21 December after it had found the feeder but before winter had set in. It was still spending considerable time foraging in the pines and only occasionally visiting the suet/peanut butter feeders.

The Boreal Chickadees at first chased the Hermit Warbler off the feeder station but later on accepted its presence  as any other local bird.

Above are four more pics prior to the snow falls of Xmas.

The Hermit Warbler in the pines near the suet feeders after a 23 December snow fall.

The two pictures above taken on the morning of Christmas Day.

The Hermit Warbler wintering in Newfoundland is an ongoing story. At this point we don't know the outcome but very few warblers have ever made it through the winter in St. John's Those that have were a few hardy Pine Warblers, once a Yellow-rumped Warbler and couple of Yellow-breasted Chats. Yellow-throated Warblers have made it to late January and early February a few times.  We will continue to feed it.

Whooping Crane Safari to Saskatchewan - 13-20 Oct 2019

My brother Andrew and I went to Saskatchewan in search of Whooping Cranes.  The Saskatoon area is well known stop over area in October. We gave ourselves a full week to find and enjoy the cranes with extra time to enjoy the other birds migrating through the prairies in October.  An area 75 minutes drive north of Saskatoon, near Marcelin, was the place to go in 2019 A good number (50!) of Whooping Crane had been reported here a few days before our arrival.

It was a royal success. On the first day we counted 110 and second day 112 Whooping Cranes. We had up to 64 in sight at one time. The huge birds with perhaps the loudest call of any bird in North America was the most wary species I had ever encountered.  Even at 500 m a car stopping on a little traveled road was enough to spook them. They were spectacular in flight. Huge birds. Photos were mainly of birds in flight. They would not fly over a human being either so even flight shots were all distant.

The spectacularly conspicuous Whooping Cranes needs a lot of space to feel comfortable. It can find these requirements in parts of sparsely populated Saskatchewan. 

Note the rusty bird in between the two white birds.  the rusty bird is a juvenile. We saw only about ten juvs.

Whooping Cranes feeding in comfort a long way from people and in a wide open terrain so it can spot potential predators (coyote) from a safe distance. 

OTHER BIRDS IN SASKATCHEWAN

Cousin to the Whooping Crane is the relatively abundant Sandhill Crane.

Sharp-tailed Grouse were fairly easy to see in the same areas as the Whooping Cranes within 30 minutes of sunrise. We saw a group of six doing a mock up of their spring dances in the corner of a remote wheat field.

An adult Golden Eagle looking for injured Snow Geese at Luck Lake caused a big stir. It was one of six Golden Eagles observed during the trip.

 This immature buteo (above and below) was a form of the Red-tailed Hawk, either a dark morph Western Red-tailed Hawk or a Harlan's.  

This stunning adult Harlan's Hawk ( just a race of the Red-tailed Hawk!) was one of the highlights of the trip.

This fat dog with the black tail was one of hundreds of Black-tailed Prairie Dogs preparing for hibernation at Grassland National Park.

Buffalo were reintroduced to Grasslands in 1996 and certainly fit the part now.

Best bird in the Grasslands Nat Park was this close fly over encounter of a gorgeous, pale morph adult Ferruginous Hawk.

See Part II below for the Geese of Saskatchewan.

Saskatchewan Part II - The Geese

The geese in Saskatchewan are amazing. The sheer volume is incomprehensible. Yah! so you come across 50,000 Snow Geese in a roadside lake. No big deal. No one rushes out to see such, for such events are commonplace scattered about the southern half of the province.  They feed in the cut wheat fields in the morning and evening and rest by day in the larger ponds/lakes.  Snow Geese were the most numerous species.  Among the Snows there were always some Ross's.  White-fronted Geese seemed more local.  However, we came across 25,000 resting by day at a lake that also hosted 100,000 Snow Geese.  A local farmer said he'd never seen so many geese as this fall. Canada Geese were abundant but often formed their own concentrations separate from the Snow Goose throngs. Among them it was fun to see the Cackling Geese. Sometimes there were sizable flocks of Cacklers with a few large Canada Geese sticking out like ugly ducklings among the flock. I am a non-believer in giving Cackling Goose full species status. The experience in Sask did nothing to change my mind. There are lots of in betweens. Even among the Cacklers there were differences, some with white breast some with dark breasts, a few with white rings around the neck. There is no doubt that Cacklers are a cute form of the Canada Goose but best left as a subspecies if I could change the rules back to the way they were.

One Bald Eagle fly over caused a mass flush of 30-40,000 Snow Geese feeding in a recently cut wheat field. The sound of that many panicked geese nearly lifted us off the ground.

Beware of low flying geese.

Within the flocks this is what it looks like.

Breakfast in a wheat field.

Pretty easy to pick out the two Ross's Geese by the stubby bills.

One Ross's, One Snow.

There are eight Ross's in this picture.

There are three easy Ross's  and one near Ross's in this flock.

Didn't do so well on photographs of the Greater White-fronted Geese even though they were less jumpy than the Snow Geese. They were my favourite goose to watch.

Speckle-bellies is a secondary name for the White-fronted Goose.

Who Made Who? Three Cacklers with two larger Canada Geese.

Mixture of Cacklers and other Canada Geese

A few large Canada Geese among this flock of Cacklers.

A parade of Cacklers.

Not a goose but related. Tundra Swans were commonly present in low hundreds compared to tens of thousands of geese.

Tundra Swans, gray immatures with white adults.

A sub adult Trumpeter Swan on the right with an adult Tundra Swan. Fairly easy to see the differences in the bill size and shape of feathering around bill in this photo. It was the only Trumpeter Swan we noticed. Not sure of its status in Saskatchewan.