Yesterday, I participated in Toronto's Christmas Bird Count. We had a really slow start in the rain, but things picked-up a bit through the day and we found some good birds: notably an Indigo Bunting and a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. Later in the day, after I had dried out, I saw the preliminary summary: a record number of species by 4 and 3 new species for the count. This was the 113th count, and we had 3 new species. Wow!
After the self congratulation wore off, it was a more sober, "wow": None of the new species were strays from the north, west, or east. They were all fairly common breeders or migrants in Toronto that simply shouldn't be here in December. It really makes me wonder at the changes we will see as our world warms up.
BB
