Going to popular bird watching locations during migration season is certainly peak birding and a whole lot of fun, so is chasing after some tropical rarity way out of its range and so is traveling to some new location and exploring the bird life there. I love all of those forms of bird watching and have and will do them all in the future. However, one of the many charming elements of bird watching is that you can do it anywhere and integrate it with gardening, grocery shopping, daydreaming while working etc etc.
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| Eastern Phoebe hunting outside my window while I was working |
Enter Yard Birding. Not a new concept and popular in the birding community with many people having incredible yard lists. In the fall I moved out of my place in Mt. Nemo (just outside of Burlington, Ontario). I had put enough birding hours and energy into the spot over the 3 years that I lived there that I figured it warranted a sentimental blog post in its honor. Most of my birding in the yard consisted of morning walkarounds or when I would notice something flying over while doing some chores or the times I would do an informal hawk watch during breaks while I was working from home.
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| Cooper and Cassie Enjoying the yard |
As far as habitat goes, the yard is 270 m above sea level, slightly elevated compared to the low elevation closer to Lake Ontario. The yard is large and mostly grass. With many mature trees such as the Silver Maple in the above image. There were two clusters of trees, one at the back of the property which extended a fair bit and a smaller one through the middle of the property lining a mostly dry creek with some scrubby undergrowth as well. The yard backed on to a fairly large active quarry and was near Mt. Nemo Conservation Area (Two of my other favourite bird watching spots that might warrant a post of their own...)
Currently the yard sits at 517 checklists which is my top spot on ebird by # of checklists (edging out #2 by around 350 checklists). The yard list sits at 114 birds which would put it at the 80th most productive spot in Halton county according to ebird. By family, 18 warbler species, 10 sparrow species and 11 raptor species. I definitely missed some gettable birds, Indigo Bunting, Blue-Winged Warbler, Veery, Hermit Thrush (how did I miss that!?) and Evening Grosbeak should have been doable with more time and better luck off the top of my head. Also some nocturnal flight call stuff but thats birding for ya.
Birds that I could find on pretty much any given day year round: Northern Cardinal, American Goldfinch, American Robin, Mourning Dove, Canada Goose, Black-Capped Chickadee, Blue Jy Common Raven, American Crow, Red-Tailed Hawk, White & Red Breasted Nuthatches and European Starling.
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| A Blue Jay gorging on sunflower seeds |
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| The Starling Flocks visible over the Quarry |
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| Raven that breeds in the quarry |
Birds I could reliably see in the summer months: (Northern) House Wren, Chipping Sparrow, Red-Winged Blackbird, Common Grackle, Turkey Vulture, Cedar Waxwing, Yellow Warbler, Gray Catbird and Song Sparrow.
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| House Wren that made its presence known all summer |
Birds that I could see normally in the winter were Dark-Eyed Junco, White-Throated Sparrow, Pine Siskin, House Finch, American Tree Sparrow, House Sparrow.
Everything else was mostly from one-dozens of records in migration or birds like Red-Bellied Woodpecker or Eastern Bluebird which were certainly in the area but never with the reliability I wanted.
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| The few times Eastern Bluebirds Visited the yard made me jealous of more southern areas where they are more regular suburban yard visitors |
Now that we have the stats and background out of the way I can discus some birding highlights and memories.
One that stands out to me is my quest for a Golden Eagle in October 2022. A golden eagle was a bird that had always eluded me. When I was a younger bird watcher, my family would always go to hawkwatches earlier in the year which is great timing for watching thousands of Broad-Winged Hawks but not for seeing hardier birds like Golden Eagles. Other than those trips to Hawk Cliff, my raptor watching was limited to opportunistic viewing up until Fall 2022.
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| Red Shouldered Hawk - Note the lovely 'crescents' at the end of its wings |
On a day in late October with favourable winds I set up shop on my back porch with a blanket, my binoculars and camera nearby (and of course my work laptop). I would do some work, look up after a while and repeat the cycle. Activity predictably picked up in the afternoon. At 4:00 I had seen 6 Red Shouldered Hawks, 8 Red Tails, 2 Bald Eagles but no golden!
Finally late in the afternoon, after being outside watching the sky for 6 hours, I managed to see a nice looking immature Golden Eagle.
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| I had to make a choice between taking a good picture and showing the bird to my roommate.. I chose the latter (never claimed to be a national geographic photographer ok) |
The following year I was fortunate enough to see a couple more Golden Eagles from my yard! Those three eagles plus a random Golden Eagle I saw vacationing in Italy are my only records as of publishing.
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| 2023 Yard Golden Eagle |
Another striking large bird to grace my yard was the Sandhill Crane. I was kindly alerted to them by their loud prehistoric sounding rattle calls as they flew over (look up their audio if you are not familiar).
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| I counted 204 for the day |
It was marvelous to see this spectacle as they would circle around the area and I would eagerly await a new flock to come in. November 28 has been the date they seem to come through the area in numbers.
My yard has also hosted some other goodies likes some late Scarlet Tanagers
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and this Eastern Screech Owl I found getting mobbed by some Jays and chickadees.
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| Spring Cape May Warbler |
Certainly I was very lucky to have such a tremendous yard for a while. I am writing this in the depths of February in Toronto. My "yard/balcony" birds are European Starlings and House Sparrows most of the time. Unless I happen to see a flyover Wood Stork or Anhinga or perhaps a flowerbed Yellow Rail, this yard likely won't be getting a post immortalizing its birding history (however I am a 15 minute bike ride from one of the top bird watching locations in Ontario, 'so I got that going for me, which is nice'.) Despite that, its fun appreciating the small Golden Crowned Kinglet flocks in migration, the handful of warblers that brave residential trees, Northern Mockingbirds that somehow make it through winter, Chimney Swifts twittering in twilight and as my wife likes to appreciate, the "gutsy" pigeons and House Sparrows risking it all for a little something something.
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