Last Easter Monday we made a quick visit to Bruce's Mills Conservation Area, on the Stouffville sideroad between the 404 and Stouffville. The gatekeeper waived the $7. per adult fee when we told him we just had an hour to spare for a bit of birding. We drove right in, past the mill and the soccer fields and kept right until the last parking lot. Walking into the woods, we descended to a bridge over a creek. There is a large hardwood which has been ravaged by Pileated Woodpeckers. We were treated to a sustained view of the male at work about forty feet up the tree. He wasn't shy but we stayed well back.
Other notables were a male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and a Cooper's Hawk, gender unknown, which was zooming around scaring the numerous Robins and Starlings.
