Author: Rick Wright

Incredibly, we awoke this morning to snow on the ground and snow in the air.

I grumbled for a few minutes, put on another pair of socks, and set out to meet the group for another day’s birding in urban Vancouver. We started at sunrise at Vanier Park, where the little pond did its work for us: the drake Eurasian Wigeon was on the water, probably reluctant to graze on snow-covered lawns, and a marvelously tiny Cackling Goose, no doubt the one present for some days now, was floating among the Mallards.

Our first big surprise, though, came before we even got to the edge of the water. The caterwauling of Northwestern Crows barely drew my attention; they seem to cry wolf every morning on the English Bay shoreline, and long minutes of staring into the treetops has never produced so much as a glimpse of anything other than more crows. Happily, we paused to look at the flock anyway as it came out from behind the trees, and this time they actually had something: a Short-eared Owl was flying away as fast as it could, but it was no match for the speed and skill of the crows, which struck the owl half a dozen times as we watched the mob and its victim fly ever higher and ever farther out over the water.

Warmed by excitement, we got back in the vehicles and headed west to Jericho Park.

Just as we arrived, the skies brightened and the snow stopped; all we had to worry about were the great gloppy chunks of wet snow falling from the branches, several of which scored direct hits on each of us as the morning went on.

Even when the early sun made a valiant effort to break out, the ponds and woods were fairly quiet. We found a single female Eurasian Wigeon among the Mallards and American Wigeons, and Varied Thrushes and American Goldfinches paused for excellent views in the treetops. The real fun, though, was on, and over, English Bay.

Big flocks of Surf and White-winged Scoters shared the bay with decent numbers of Common and Red-throated Loons and a few Horned and Western Grebes. Red-breasted Mergansers, newly arrived, are molting into their bright basic plumage, and you can’t complain about a day when you see almost (almost) as many Common as Barrow’s Goldeneye.

The day’s best bird, and the day’s worst bird, came while I was scoping out beyond the middle of the bay. Pelagic Cormorant, Double-crested Cormorant, Horned Grebe, Mew Gull … Ancient Murrelet! The bird was distant and active, and I got to see it twice for a total of two or three seconds–and that was two or three seconds more than anyone else in the group got, transforming a great sighting into a frustrating experience. Maybe Monday, when we’re riding the ferry to Active Pass and Swartz Bay. Maybe. Fingers, toes, eyes crossed!

We tarried and scanned, but finally had to give up and move farther out the bay. Acadia Beach was nude of sunbathers, but very birdy where the snow had melted on the grass. A flock of at least eleven Varied Thrushes was with us the entire time, and a male Downy Woodpecker doubled the trip’s picid tally so far.

My wellies had kept my feet dry and bitter cold, so I was happy when early afternoon came and we headed back into Kitsilano for lunch. I think we’ll all sleep tonight with dreams of alcids in our heads–and awake in the morning looking forward to Westham Island and the wonders of Reifel.

Wow. I’d thought that a maritime climate meant that we wouldn’t have to worry about precipitation of the white flavor, but I was wrong.

The north shore mountains were white when I stepped outside, and they stayed that way all day. Fortunately, the dusting on roofs and lawns here in town vanished pretty quickly, and my doughty Long Weekend crew had a great morning on Sea and Iona Islands.

Here we are standing on the Iona causeway, admiring the same flock of 3,100 Dunlin that caught the eye of an adult Peregrine Falcon. As we watched, he (a small bird) dropped out of nowhere onto a hapless Dunlin, which he carried across the little cove to eat from a conspicuous perch. That’s one falcon that’s got it made for the winter, I’d say!

The sturdy Snow Geese grubbing in the marsh at low tide had nothing to fear from that bird, of course, though I noticed that they deigned to raise their heads and move a bit into the vegetation whenever one of the local wintering Bald Eagles got up and around. Not even the eagles seemed to trouble the Trumpeter Swans, though, grumbling contentedly to themselves a bit offshore.

This species is clearly arriving in the Fraser Valley: we saw small flocks at every one of our stops, and the last was trailed by three Tundra Swans, a nice surprise and an uncommonish bird here on the coast.

Passerine birding was a little bit harder this morning in the cold and the breeze–and it wasn’t made any easier by the presence of two dashing Northern Shrikes on the island.

This one, perched above the outer ponds at Iona Beach, had his eye on the Golden-crowned and Song Sparrows, but I bet he wouldn’t have turned up that hooked beak of his had one of the four late Barn Swallows we found happened to come within easy reach.

Our timing once again proved excellent. Just as we started to get a little tired, a little cold, and a lot hungry, the skies open and we got the first real rain of the day. So it was into the cars and back to Kitsilano for a warming lunch and a review of our list, which after two mornings is now approaching 80 species.

Tomorrow: Vanier and Jericho Parks. I checked Vanier after dropping the group off at their hotel–a nice selection of ducks on the little pond, including the winter resident Eurasian Wigeon, and a couple of thousand Surf Scoters on the waters of the bay.

It’s going to be another good day. Cold, but good.

I’ve never had any trouble identifying female Eurasian Wigeon.

That should be the sort of prideful proclamation that precedes a tumble, but in fact, it’s a shame-faced confession. Put another way, I’ve never managed to find a female wigeon that I thought problematic.

And that, sadly, has nothing to do with skill or experience; it bespeaks rather a willingness to simply overlook any wigeon that doesn’t stick out conspicuously as one species or the other. I suspect that I’m not alone in this: even where Eurasian is relatively frequent among the flocks of Americans, as it is here in even the most urban parts of Vancouver, it’s just so much easier to look for a dark-headed female (or a drake!), ignoring the more subtle birds. And there must be more subtle birds.

If you’re interested in joining me in my resolve to start paying attention to female wigeon, have a look at a fine article by Jessie Barry and Cameron Cox; I’m not convinced that every character proposed there holds up for every bird, but they provide an excellent checklist of features to look at when examining a potentially difficult bird.

There’s never a bad time to look closely at American Wigeon, but this time of year is especially rewarding, with Eurasian Wigeon a real possibility pretty much anywhere in North America. I didn’t find any today at Reifel Refuge, but I did run across this fine-looking “pied” male American.

Birds like this–where the ground color of the head is a nearly unmarked white or rich cream–are rarish, but they’re known throughout western North America. Surprisingly, there remains very little written about this variant. Who wants to take on the challenge and produce a little paper about “pied” wigeon?

How beautiful these past warm mornings have been here in Vancouver!

The birds have been enjoying the weather, too, and I walked through Jericho this morning to the accompaniment of all kinds of song, from Red-winged Blackbirds to Golden-crowned and Sooty Fox Sparrows.

The voice of the morning, though, belonged to the Pacific Wrens.

After weeks of relative silence, these little feathered blobs have started to sing and sing and sing, and the woods and the brambles once again sound alive.