Carden Plain Birding Area north of Kirkfield

[skyviewer]

Was up in Kirkfield working today i checked and found a post of a birding area just north of town so i decided to check it out and do some birding.  Man talk about some crazy back roads.  I swear i heard a banjo off in the woods a few times.

Seen some bobolinks, meadowlarks, gold finches, 1 eastern bluebird, cedar waxwings, a house wren, american kestrel or merlin? (smaller bird it looked more like a merlin in my bird book going by the colouring), eastern kingbird, a northern harrier? (got a quick glimpse as it flew over of its markings with brown and white spots not stripes on the tail, i was in the middle of nowhere heavy woods with a marsh nearby when i saw it)
And finally i seen two of these birds.  They were around the size of a blue jay but could have been a bit smaller.  The colouring was like a cardinals but was a light brown colour.  Anyone have a guess?

[Greg Schneider]

Your harrier ID sounds correct, and the other bird is likely a brown thrasher.

[skyviewer]

I looked up a picture of the brown thrasher and the bird i saw had more even coloriing and its shaping especially in the head looked more like a blue jays.  It was pretty much solid in colour like a cardinal bur it was a medium brown colour with a hint of red in it.  I seen two of them in separate areas and as soon as they saw me they flew into the lower branches of a cedar tree.

[Kin Lau]

Did you try looking up a female cardinal?

[Greg Schneider]

In that case I would agree with Kin.

[jcw]

what about a cedar waxwing??

[skyviewer]

It defintely wasn't a female cardinal because it was bigger and there was no red on this bird at all.  It did resemble the colouring of a cedar waxwing but a little darker and it did not have the yellow tip on the tail or the red on the wings.  It was bigger more the size of a large blue jay or bigger.

[Kin Lau]

Well, a juvi Common Grackle might fit. Most of the young at this time are brown.

[skyviewer]

I think you got it there Lau.  I found some pictures of some juvenile Grackles on the internet.  The colour did vary in the pics i saw but the one pic here is very similar to the colour i saw and now that i think about it did resemble a grackle.  What i meant by the red is i thought it may have been a bit burgundy but it was defintely all brown.




thanks