First Twitch of 2026 - Red-Flanked Bluetail

When a "Mega" rarity is seen 25 minutes from your house, it is pretty hard not to go twitch it. This morning I went to Great Falls Park in Virginia to chase a Red-flanked Bluetail, a vagrant from Asia. This is only the second time that it has been seen on the east coast of North America, how it got here is a very fun thought exercise. 

Namesake Blue tail

& Namesake Red Flanks!

Chasing a rarity like this is always exciting and even better when you get to see it.

Great American Road Trip of 2025 - Part 2 - Into Yellowstone

Yellowstone was (after Minneapolis) our next stop that we would be spending some time at. I picked out a state park that we could stay at in Montana about halfway between Badlands and Yellowstone called Cooney State Park. The drive through Eastern Wyoming and Montana was mostly uneventful as we skipped sightseeing destinations on the way in favour of saving our energy for Yellowstone.

Cute little fox patrolling the reservoir

Cooking Setup for the Night (Pasta, Tomato Sauce and some rehydrated soy crumble)

Our Tent

 As you might be able to tell from the photo there was not a lot of shelter in the campground and we ended up having quite the poor sleep as the wind and rain really picked up in the night. I ended up having to bring our car right beside the tent as a windbreak, but we made it through without blowing away.

 

We had planned to go to take the Beartooth Highway to get into the northern part of Yellowstone, a beautiful, mountainous drive with lots of high elevation birding potential (Black Rosy Finches were theoretically possible!!!). We took a long winding road to the top and unfortunately they had just closed the highway when we reached the top (and no warning at all at the bottom of the mountain). Might have been for the best but we had to turn around and take a longer route.

Convoy of crestfallen cars

 

First Moose of the trip

 Despite the morning's setbacks, we arrived at the gates of Yellowstone with minimal issues. Driving into Yellowstone I was blown away by the beauty of it all. Photos do not come close to doing it justice. Vast plains, dense forest and looming mountains makes for quite the impression. 'They don't make mountains like this in Ontario' is something I mused to myself often.

The crowds were kind of brutal, lots of traffic jams caused by people looking at bears, bison and birds (actually the last one might have just been us). But can you blame other people for appreciating what you are also trying to appreciate?

Bison Jam

We stayed at Mammoth Campground for our stay at Yellowstone, it was absolutely gorgeous. Got to see my lifer Townsend Solitaire and enjoy lots of Mountain Chickadees, Black Billed Magpies and Clark's Nutcrackers waltzing around as well as flocks of Pine Siskins.

Does not get much better than this...

Elk just hanging out in the campground, Hearing them Yodeling at night was a treat

 

A lot of our Yellowstone experience was in the car as we couldn't leave our dogs and could not take dogs on any of the backcountry trails which made for a lot of driving around the park. We drove the Lamar valley and had incredible views of Bison Herds.

 We also took turns seeing Grand Prismatic Spring (Along with Old Faithful, one of the highlights of Yellowstone.)

Otherwordly Colours

Cooper was not impressed

 

Another Stunning Vista

We had an incredible time in Yellowstone. Hopefully sometime we will return and it will live in our memories. As far as the trip goes, we set off north to Glacier National Park.

Great American Road Trip of 2025 - From Toronto to The Badlands

So far in life, my experience with exploring the United States has mainly been limited to Florida on March break vacations as a kid, and then the occasional trip to New York City, Chicago or Detroit. This all changed when in mid September Lily and I set off with our two dogs, our RAV4 on the way to her parents place in California! We wanted to enjoy our travel, see some sights but not dally too long!

Our first day we traveled from Toronto to Mackniaw City on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. We stayed at a motel. The drive was pretty similar to a central Ontario drive (beautiful) and we were just beginning to see the changing of the colours! A common theme that develops even more and more across our trip is how we could have spent a week at each of our stops and still felt that there was more to see. I would love to spend more time in the Lake Michigan - Lake Superior area sometime.

The second day we drove to Minneapolis-St. Paul Minnesota to visit our friends who lived there. We were blown away by how beautiful St. Paul was! The lakes, the trees, the houses, the lack of traffic especially was refreshing compared to Toronto. If we aren't too scared off by the brutal winter it would be on our shortlist of where we could end up one day. We even got to tour our host's bee lab which gave me a new appreciation for bees, maybe one day I'll get into insects... 

Cooper, Cassie and their friend Ror enjoying the Mississippi River

 

Some fantastic pastries at 'Diane's Place' in Minneapolis

Nature wise everything was fairly similar to Ontario with American White Pelicans being one of the few 'new' species. however that was beginning to change as we left through the plains of Minnesota for South Dakota.

The first of MANY Wall Drug signs in South Dakota with a field of Sorghum in the background 

 It was a treat seeing 100s of Franklin's Gulls over the fields as we whizzed through the state. At stops now, Eastern Meadowlarks were replaced by their Western counterparts. Our stop that night was Badlands National Park which was an incredible sight! Camping with them in sight was a highlight of the trip, the campground being better than expected!

 

The Badlands!

 

 

Mountain Bluebird in the campground

 

That morning we also tried looking for a Burrowing Owl that would be a lifer for us and a cool bird to see. We pulled up an Ebird map of past sightings and drove down a side road. Lily found some mixed in with Meadowlarks and Prairie dogs which made for a great start to our day! This was also our first time seeing Prairie Dogs which were so adorable! Cooper and Cassie wanted to play with them but for the good of everyone they were on leash.

Burrowing Owl - Such a cool bird

 

Western Meadowlark and Prairie Dogs

Clay-Coloured Sparrow

We loaded up on some supplies at Wall Drug and continued westward!

Tourist Trapped!

Neotropic Cormorant and Other Treats from Early Spring

I am writing this in mid April and the excitement and thrill of spring migration is ramping up and soon to reach its peak in Toronto in May. So far the highlight has been a "self found" Neotropic Cormorant I picked out in Tommy Thompson Park in Toronto. Similar to the abundant Double-Crested Cormorant, it is a vagrant from the South with their usual range being Texas - Argentina.

Note the Dark Lores (Area between eye and bill) that would be orange on a Double Crested, among other field marks like longer tail, hint of white surrounding the face etc...

Being on the review list for Ontario (not for long I predict as it is becoming more and more common in Ontario), this is probably the rarest bird I have found (other candidates being an American White Pelican and Black Vulture at the Mitchell Sewage Lagoons, relatively more common species but Toronto is a birdier spot than Mitchell by far). The bird looked odd compared to nearby cormorants when I was scanning a marshy area and I am happy I gave it a second look!

Almost equally exciting to me was seeing some Eastern Bluebirds at the Mitchell Sewage Lagoons. The males looked especially electric blue in the leafless forest.

Female

Male

 

 A Sora was also a lovely sight 

 

Nothing like a crisp Swamp Sparrow!

 

Yellow Bellied Sapsuckers and Brown Creepers are almost everywhere.

 

Bonus Groundhog and Muskrat pics