Saturday
Officially summer is still one week away, but it seems like summer at the spit. No new birds on Saturday but three types of butterfly and one dragonfly. Still, there were birds and I took pictures of several of them.
Common terns:
Great egret:
Red-winged blackbird:
Tree swallows:
Eastern kingbird perched . . .
. . . and in flight:
Here is a female mallard with her three adorable ducklings:
The ducklings in a row:
Sunday
Sunday I was able to find two birds that have eluded me despite being around for a month – Orchard oriole and Bank swallow (149 YTD).
A hungry Tree swallow (this is the same box as yesterday’s swallow picture):
Gadwall:
On every street corner in the city, yet fairly uncommon in the wilds of the spit:
This Red-winged blackbird had a bill full of insect but still managed to constantly screech and warn me off:
This Great egret stopped for a rest and was harassed by common terns . . .
. . . finally giving up and flying away:
There were spotted sandpipers all over the place:
There were killdeers everywhere as well:
Here’s a Willow flycatcher:
On a sadder note, both last weekend and this there have only been six Trumpeter cygnets – you may recall, there were seven when I first found them two weeks ago. At any rate, the six remaining are getting bigger and look healthy:
Finally, the big turtle mentioned in the title. Here is a Snapping turtle (quite a bit smaller than the one I found last summer, but still a good sized beast:
And here’s his handsome visage:
And his dinosaur-like tail:
It’s the time of year to get out to the spit in the evenings when it’s cooler (not that it’s been hot in the days so far this year). There are plenty of birds, insects, herptiles, mammals, and wildflowers to see, but being out in the fresh air on my bike on the shores of Lake Ontario is reason enough to go there – all that ‘living’ stuff is a bonus.
northernshrike 