More migrants, some late leps, a cactus conundrum and a house of yesteryear

 Autumn is unfolding as it should, and that means there are lots of things to photograph. A few days ago I was out in the Erieau area. I took time to check the main pier, as the uncommon Purple Sandpiper could appear any day. I walked all the way to the end, flushing a multitude of the usual gulls along the way, but only came up with a single Sanderling right at the end.

Maybe next time there will be a Purple Sandpiper to greet me.

A walk along the Erieau Marsh Trail and McGeachy Pond Trail is often worthwhile, so I included it in my itinerary. There was a nice mix of passerines, including:

Eastern Phoebe

Northern Parula

There were several others, but due to the very contrasty light, were hard to photograph.

Butterflies, on the other hand, were typically out in the open where they could benefit from the sunlight energy while nectaring on the flowers. The deep purple of New England Aster seemed to be the main flower attraction.

Orange Sulphur

Clouded Sulphur

The first two are pretty common, but these next ones are much less common. In fact the Fiery Skippers, of which there were several, were the first ones I had photographed this year.

Bronze Coppers, shown next, are to be expected at some point and usually much more common than the Fiery Skippers.

Female

Male

I also spent a bit of time up along some accessible areas along Lake St. Clair. There were some migrants, not surprisingly, including a good number of Blue Jays on the wing....

 

 ...and some even landed for another shot.

There were a lot of Yellow-rumped Warblers, by far the most abundant warbler almost everywhere you go these days.

And since it is still relatively early in the season, a few Great Egrets are to be found, and occasionally are in an excellent spot to be photographed.

On another outing, I photographed this Prickly Pear Cactus. Cacti of this type are popular, and always fun to be found. But they present a problem, mainly in the taxonomy. What species is it? For many years, the cacti known in southern Ontario were called Eastern Prickly Pear (Opuntia humifusa). A bit later, taxonomists changed the name to Opuntia cespitosa, and most of the ones are still known as that. However this first one apparently is a different species, known as Grassland Prickly Pear (Opuntia cymochila). It is more of a western species, but due to the arrangement and angle of the spines, is believed by Opuntia experts to be this species. This makes for an interesting element to Ontario's Opuntia, as this particular population in the former Howard Township was quite abundant back in the 1940s. A former co-worker of mine, when I was at Rondeau back in the late 1970s, told me of this population which occurred in a large sandy area almost right across the road from where he and his wife lived. His wife was a teacher at the schoolhouse just down the road, and walked by this population almost every day. That was back in the mid 1940s. However as time went on, the sandy area was converted to agriculture, and it eliminated most of the cactus. Now only a couple of dozen plants persist in the road allowance.

Another population of cactus occurs at Rondeau, in the southeast beach dunes. They do not occur there naturally, as some unknown persons transplanted them there in about 1994. They have done fairly well there since. This population has been determined to be genetically similar to the naturally occurring population on Pelee Island. Therefore the species is legally endangered under the province's Endangered Species Act. The conundrum is: what to do with these plants? They are endangered, sort of, but it is debatable whether transplants are covered under the Act. Or should they be removed, since they may end up being a problem species in an otherwise highly significant natural habitat in one of the most significant provincial parks in Ontario? At the moment, park staff are reluctant to remove them, so they continue where they are.

On quite a different topic than the ones above, here is one of the most photographed abandoned houses in southwestern Ontario, perhaps in all of Canada if you believe some reports. It is known as the Guyitt House, and if you google that name, you can find out lots more information about this house. Regardless, it is along the former Hwy 3, now the Talbot Trail, in eastern Chatham-Kent a short distance east of Palmyra and few kilometers before you get to the Elgin Co border. It was built in the 1840s and was occupied up until about the mid-1980s. I took these photos at various times in about 2010-2011. It has continued to deteriorate, but does so 'gracefully' and it is interesting to see the process.

I took these next two and processed them to reflect an earlier age

This next one was taken during a full moon, with a long exposure of slightly more than 300 seconds using the moon as the sole source of light. You can tell it was a long exposure by seeing the white streak just to the left of the chimney on the right hand side, which is how far a star 'moved' in those 300+seconds.

In recent weeks, an unknown person has complained about its condition, and asked the municipality to enforce a by-law forcing the owner to either repair it or remove it. This has caused a great deal of angst for the landowner, who would like to keep it as is, since it is such a popular photographic subject. The landowner gets nothing for it, just the satisfaction of having a popular photographic subject. There has been a lot of support to leave it as is. At this point nothing has been decided, so stay tuned.

Back on the lep theme, here is what Marie and I call our October Cat. It is a fairly well developed caterpillar of a Black Swallowtail. Interestingly although Black Swallowtail butterflies have been in our garden area periodically all season, it wasn't until the last couple of weeks where we could find any caterpillars.

We have seen about 7 in the last couple of weeks. Today we couldn't find any, so it is possible that the remaining ones have gone off to change over to a pupal form, in which it will overwinter.

And finally, a Magnificent Frigatebird appeared near the mouth of the Thames River yesterday. It was initially seen by some fishermen but word didn't get out until late in the day. It was believed to not be in good health. Several keen birders were there first thing this morning, and one group saw it tumble from its overnight roost and fall into the water, barely able to struggle to a log on the bank of the river. Clearly it was not likely to survive. A few people reported seeing it in the morning, and one or more believed a rehabber was tracking it down and taking it in to see if it could be saved.

Marie and I went for a drive out that way in the early afternoon. I had mixed feelings, as I don't chase as many rarities as I used to, and chasing a bird that was almost dead was not all that appealing. We didn't see it, so perhaps it has been rescued by a rehabber. I haven't heard any more on that. Update: it may have been euthanized due to its poor condition.

I wasn't too concerned about not getting to add it to my Chatham-Kent list, as I had the opportunity to see and photograph a quite healthy one off the south beach of Rondeau, back in early July of 2012.

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Mega bird rarities of the Rondeau checklist area

Back to the rare birds series, and here is hoping that the production of this blog post is a little smoother and less problematic than the previous post! Nonetheless, I need to do a bit of revising since some of my birding friends have pointed out some things that I should have considered in my first version. Thanks, guys!

With 365 species of birds on the Rondeau checklist, there are some birds that are extremely rare, with maybe only one or two appearances in spite of the intensity of birding there over the past century or more. There are some species that I just don't have any photos of that fit into this mega rarity category, including species such as Passenger Pigeon or Eskimo Curlew, obviously, but also others that are not extinct and would include White-collared Swift, Thick-billed Murre, Northern Gannet and Northern Wheatear. The swift was seen by a single observer. The murre and the gannet were way before my time at Rondeau, and when the Wheatear showed up, I was out in southern Alberta. Maybe someday I will get have the privilege of seeing these species and get photos as well.

But here are 17 species that I would place in the mega rarity category that I do have photos of. Some of them will appear near the end, in what I consider a "mega-mega rarity" category due to their very unexpected presence. A quick note here: as often as possible I have included photos of the birds actually seen at Rondeau, but in a few cases, which will be noted, they were taken elsewhere.

This first photo is of a Cinnamon Teal. There are about three records for the Rondeau area, and two of them are from birds that were shot during the autumn waterfowl hunt. Identification of them in the autumn is much more challenging, and it is possible that there are records that have been missed. There has been only one record of this species in the spring breeding plumage, in the 1990s. The photo here was taken in southern Saskatchewan in July, 2018, with a single bird surrounded by Wilson's Phalaropes.

There have been a few, scattered records of this next species, Glossy Ibis. In fact one of my earlier birding memories at Rondeau was seeing 4 of these out along the South Beach while on a birding trip with the park staff, back in about 1966. The bird shown here was taken in May, 2019, at the Keith McLean Conservation Lands just outside the park.

Lark Bunting, shown next, has only been recorded on 2-3 occasions. I have not seen this species in the Rondeau checklist area, but did see one in Essex a few years ago. This photo was taken in July, 2018, near Grasslands National Park in southern Saskatchewan.

 Little Blue Herons show up in Ontario from time to time. However there have been very few records for the Rondeau area, less than half a dozen. The one below showed up along the causeway just outside the park in late August, 1982 and stayed around for a little more than a week. There have been a few records since, usually in late summer, but nothing that I have come across since 2000, where one was seen from August 26 until September 14, during which time it was reported by numerous birders.

 There have been a few records of this next species, Sabine's Gull but it is often very hard to come by. Records across Ontario are not plentiful, but with all of the waterbirds that come through Rondeau, it is a bit surprising that we only had the first record in November, 2007 following some stormy weather. I didn't see my first one in the Rondeau area until 2015, shown below. It was seen in the Erieau area, and the south beach of Rondeau is in the distant background here.

This next species, Sage Thrasher, could almost be considered in the mega-mega category. Prior to this one that occurred in April, 1981, I believe there had only been one accepted record for Ontario. I discovered this bird well out along the Marsh Road while I was trying to track down a Louisiana Heron. I did not immediately identify this bird, and even after I got several far more experienced birders to check it out, (e.g. the late Norm Chesterfield, Alan Wormington) and we all scratched our heads, did we decide it was a Sage Thrasher. The bird stayed around for at least three weeks along the southern half of the Marsh Trail, and since it was the first real opportunity for Ontario birders (and many birders beyond Ontario) had a chance to see it, there were probably well over a thousand people who trekked out to look for it. It isn't the greatest photo as it has been scanned from a slide. Due to its rarity and celebrity status, I didn't want to venture too close and risk scaring it. Of course the photo equipment I had at the time was not as high a quality as I eventually acquired. The likes of the late Dennis Rupert and Jim Flynn, both expert photographers with high end equipment, got better photos. An interesting little side story to this bird record is that because of its fairly extended presence, about a month later I had the opportunity to spend an hour or so birding along the Tuliptree Trail with none other than Roger Tory Peterson and one other Ontario birder.

 While the bird in the previous photo was the second Ontario record, Chatham-Kent, and specifically Rondeau, was to enjoy the presence of other Sage Thrashers over the next few years. This next photo was taken at the southern end of Rondeau in the early summer of 1985, of a bird that was only present as far as we know, for a couple of days. A few years later, a bird showed up in the winter in the Wallaceburg area. And in 2008, I had one on the Christmas Bird Count out on the Marsh Trail! I think I can safely say that I am the only one who has seen 4 Sage Thrashers in Chatham-Kent.

Members of the Flycatcher family are well known for their sometimes erratic migration, and they can show up most often in the late summer. Our first record for this next one, a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, was in 1987 not far from Blenheim. Another record was in the early 2000s just outside of Rondeau, which is the bird that I saw briefly. The bird shown here is of a nice adult which I photographed in southwestern Missouri in 2009, a place where they are much more likely to be seen than in southern Ontario.

There have been a handful of records for Yellow-crowned Night-Heron in the Rondeau area, but for some reason, none in the last two decades. This first photo shows an adult that appeared along a slough on the Tuliptree Trail in May of 1990 and was seen by at least a few folks.

 This next one is a photo of an immature bird that spent some time in a slough just south of Gardiner Avenue and was seen by many over the course of the day or so it remained.

 Western Grebe is a species that for some reason is not often encountered in the Rondeau area. In fact this is the only record, and it occurred off the south beach of Rondeau in mid June of 2013. I trekked out the South Beach to get this photo. It was also seen by a few birders from Erieau, but only with 'scope views. This species likely passes through on rare occasion but is just missed, as it is seen with more frequency at the eastern end of Lake Erie and the western end of Lake Ontario.

The next few bird records are what I would consider to be "Mega-mega" rarities, although it is a personal choice as some of them aren't really any more rare than ones in the first part of this post.

There are relatively few records of Black Skimmer anywhere in Ontario. I believe there are no more than three, including the one shown here. It was present at Erieau and the south beach of Rondeau for several days in September of 1981. I think the only previous Ontario record was a flyby along Lake Ontario, and only seen by one or two birders. The bird here was seen by many especially since one could drive up to the edge of the pier and 'peer' across the channel to see it surrounded by various gulls.

There is only one or maybe two records for Brown Pelican at Rondeau. I have not seen it in the Rondeau checklist area, although the one shown here I photographed in Chatham-Kent at Wheatley harbour in late August, 2013.

There is one record for Burrowing Owl, a bird which showed up at the McGeachy Pond area back in late June of 1977. It was around for a couple of weeks. I saw the bird, but did not get any photos. The photo shown here is one I took at Grasslands National Park, in southern Saskatchewan, in June of 1986.

 The following dead specimen is of Cassin's Kingbird. I found it along the southeast beach in late November of 2013. Although it is now on the park's checklist, no one can count it since it was already dead when discovered. As mentioned previously, members of the flycatcher group are known for showing up well out of their range following, presumably, a mis-direction in their migration. I seem to recall that this bird was only the second or third record for Ontario. I think there has been one since.

 Still on the mis-directed theme associated with flycatchers, this next one fits as well. It is a Say's Phoebe, a western species found in late September of 2018, in a farm yard a bit north of Erieau. Interestingly this was the second one of this species for the Rondeau area, and credit goes to the Burks, Jim and Keith, who found both of them. The first one was in another farm setting only a couple of kilometers or so east of this one. I only got some distant photos of the first one, so will use photos of this second sighting which turned out much better. Way to go guys!

I'm not sure how many Western Tanagers have been discovered in southern Ontario, but they are very few and far between. The one shown here occurred at the southern end of Lakeshore Road at Rondeau in mid-May of 2011. Fortunately it was in prime time for many birders, so although it didn't stay around for a long time, it was seen by a fair number of birders.

During the general mid-summer lull of birding, this next one was discovered in very early July of 2012. It is a Magnificent Frigatebird, and it was present in the Rondeau area for a few days. The best views were from a boat off shore of the South Beach (thanks Ric & Anne!) as it perched at the top of an Eastern Cottonwood tree for several hours. It was apparently first seen a few kilometres east of Rondeau during some Canada Day celebrations the day before. There have been a very few records of this species showing up briefly in southern Ontario in the years before and after this record. It is likely that such birds got caught up in some severe hurricane type storms that arrived from the south and got blown well north of their normal more tropical range.

Last, and certainly not least, of the Mega-mega rarities is this next one: Great Kiskadee. It is not a species known for meandering beyond their normal range of the extreme southwestern USA and Mexico and even farther south. So for this one to show up and cooperate/tease/tantalize thousands of birders for a week to ten days at a time, off and on from early September until early December of 2018, was nothing short of phenomenal. It is the first Canadian record, and since it spent its entire known time at Rondeau in the north end, including the beginning of the Marsh Trail, and the southern end of the campground, birders who put in a bit of time were guaranteed to have satisfying to excellent, if not crippling, views.

There will be a couple of articles in an upcoming issue of Ontario Birds, the official publication of the Ontario Field Ornithologists, so for any member of OFO, be on the lookout for it. One article has been written by Laura Rainbow Dragon, the finder of this incredible bird, while I have written a related article discussing a bit of background on this species and some extralimital records.

There are a few other species which I would love to feature as part of this series, including Tropical Kingbird, Black Rail, Lazuli Bunting, Gyrfalcon, Bell's Vireo, Bewick's Wren, Swainson's Warbler, Black-throated Gray Warbler, Painted Bunting, etc. but I have yet to get photos of them. Perhaps in a future post if I am so fortunate to photograph them!