Humber River Trail May 5

[Ally]

I think I offended the Yellow. He was nowhere to be seen today. Saw no warbler today.
The deer was not happy to about seeing me twice. The remains were in the stream, someone pulled it out.

[Ally]

Rare sight of the 'reed' pecker, who knows a thing or two about peekaboo.

[Ally]

Always happy to see the piper. The feeling I don't share with him.

[Shortsighted]

What made you pick Humber Bay Park for your photo destination? It seems to me that you have seldom featured this site in the past. Do you refer to posted eBird sightings when deciding on your next outing, or do you just make regular rounds to cover all the bases. If memory serves, I always associated Humber Bay with water fowl, but not so much with warblers. In the past, the best sites for warblers out west has been Sam Smith (perimeter of sports bowl) and Rattray Marsh. Out east the best sites were always Ashbridges Bay spit and then way out east at Thickson Woods (Whitby). So far, none of these preferred sites have reported much warbler activity beyond the occasional Palm warbler or Yellow-rumped. Ashbridges had a Yellow-throated a little while ago. This morning I heard a Common Yellowthroat but couldn't visually locate it. The Rouge should have had a few early warblers by this date but so far I haven't seen any. What I'm mainly hearing lately, and fleetingly seeing but can't get close to is the House wren. I saw three of them today, or it may have been the same wren over three locations next to Highland Creek. No sign of Hermit thrush though ... not even one. What drives me crazy is that I'm always spotting something while looking into the sun. I spooked two Black-crowned night herons but didn't see them perched because they were south of me and therefore into the light. I was really close too. Why can't I spot something interesting with the sun behind me for once?

[Ally]

What made you pick Humber Bay Park for your photo destination? It seems to me that you have seldom featured this site in the past. Do you refer to posted eBird sightings when deciding on your next outing, or do you just make regular rounds to cover all the bases. If memory serves, I always associated Humber Bay with water fowl, but not so much with warblers. In the past, the best sites for warblers out west has been Sam Smith (perimeter of sports bowl) and Rattray Marsh. Out east the best sites were always Ashbridges Bay spit and then way out east at Thickson Woods (Whitby). So far, none of these preferred sites have reported much warbler activity beyond the occasional Palm warbler or Yellow-rumped. Ashbridges had a Yellow-throated a little while ago. This morning I heard a Common Yellowthroat but couldn't visually locate it. The Rouge should have had a few early warblers by this date but so far I haven't seen any. What I'm mainly hearing lately, and fleetingly seeing but can't get close to is the House wren. I saw three of them today, or it may have been the same wren over three locations next to Highland Creek. No sign of Hermit thrush though ... not even one. What drives me crazy is that I'm always spotting something while looking into the sun. I spooked two Black-crowned night herons but didn't see them perched because they were south of me and therefore into the light. I was really close too. Why can't I spot something interesting with the sun behind me for once?

Is that your way telling me to go there next? I haven't gone to humber bay for a long while. My humber river trail is my comfort birding place when I come home from work.


A ground hog turned up briefly and a RTH. And some mysterious hawk flew by while I was climbing up from the ravine. Couldn't ID it, but the birds sounded alarms.

[Shortsighted]

Far enough. I'm not hinting or suggesting you go anywhere in particular, merely stating those sites I found to be fairly good warbler haunts in the past. I totally get the local site representing a comfort zone and that is very important in my opinion. Your comfort zone is likely a place that you know well and have visited often enough to develop a sort of special sense about where and when to look and how to approach each nook and cranny. Besides, it involves less travel time and therefore more time for birding. You will also know what to wear because you know the type of terrain that you will pass through. I almost always wear rubber boots at this time of year, but now I also have chest waders for swampy sites.
Good luck on your next outing ... and remember to de-tick.
 

[Ally]

I have met the gentliest black throated green. First King bird.

[Shortsighted]

I was just thinking this morning that Petticoat Creek Park near the lakefront looks like a good location for flycatchers and that I have not seen an Eastern kingbird this year, nor any other flycatchers beyond the two Eastern phoebe in the Rouge lands. Then here you go and snap a kingbird. Did you hear the buzzy call of the BTG warbler? Oh ya, I just remembered, I did see (yesterday) a single BG Gnatcatcher high in a small tree. So, I guess that's sort of a flycatcher. I heard its feeble wheezy call before seeing it, so I knew it was in the tree somewhere, just too high to bother trying to take a photo of it.