October 22nd - Turkey Vultures!!!

With almost no wind, today was a fairly slow day up until about 2:15PM. We were standing looking out over the lake when Tom, who was facing more towards the north, jokingly and very nonchalantly said "Oh, what's that?" I turned around just in time to see the north sky blackening with Vultures. I quickly went over to look through the back gap to see and count the first ones passing through. Within 15 minutes we had tallied up 178 of them streaming passed. As the Vultures were finishing up a Bald Eagle appeared over the centre of the park.

Today:
Turkey Vulture - 178
Osprey - 2
Bald Eagle - 1 (adult 2:30)
Northern Harrier - 2
Sharp-shinned Hawk - 16
Cooper's Hawk - 5
Red-shouldered Hawk - 4
Red-tailed Hawk - 5
American Kestrel - 4
Merlin - 3
Peregrine Falcon - 3
Total - 223

To Date:
Turkey Vulture - 1736
Osprey - 124
Bald Eagle - 57
Northern Harrier - 180
Sharp-shinned Hawk - 1661
Cooper's Hawk - 77
Northern Goshawk - 14
Red-shouldered Hawk - 11
Broad-winged Hawk - 757
Red-tailed Hawk - 131
Golden Eagle - 1
American Kestrel - 620
Merlin - 122
Peregrine Falcon - 40
Total - 5531

American Kestrel

Merlin

Osprey

Red-shouldered Hawk

Red-tailed Hawk

Passing overhead today were several thousand Blackbirds in mixed flocks and many small flocks of Cedar Waxwings. Down on the lake 300+ Common Loons were counted.

Cedar Waxwing

Another fabulous bunch of people on hand today including: Lorne, Ann, Mike 2, Berle, Peter, Pat, Norm, Freida, Sam, Mike 3, Franca, Betty, Chris, Tom, Gunnar, Bob, Ron, Allison, Mark, Margaret, Carol, Sherri, and Cori.

Walter