Bruce Pit Specialties

Gray Treefrog

Although Bruce Pit is chiefly known as a popular dog park, the walking trails around the pond (which are not part of the off-leash area) are great for finding all kinds of interesting flora and fauna. I usually make a couple of trips to the pond each summer, looking for specific butterflies, frogs and odonates which are difficult to find elsewhere. Although it’s been a few years since I’ve seen some of the more unique insects – including American Copper, Eastern Red Damsel, Amber-winged Spreadwing and Saffron-winged Meadowhawk – other frog and insect populations are still doing well.

My first visit of the summer occurred on July 5th in the hope of finding an Acadian Hairstreak at the base of the toboggan hill – the only place I’ve ever seen one in the west end. I hadn’t seen any here since 2014 and 2016 and doubted they were still around, especially after I saw how few wildflowers were left to grow near the marshy area in my failed attempt to see them last year. I failed again on this visit, too, but proceeded to check a few other spots where the milkweed was blooming as these flowers are known to be insect magnets.

Amber and Saffron Wings

Saffron-winged Meadowhawk

It’s been a good season for hard-to-find dragonflies at the Eagleson Ponds. Ever since I discovered both Eastern Amberwings and Saffron-winged Meadowhawks here in 2017 I’ve been spending more time here later in the day looking for odes, rather than doing a quick search for birds first thing in the morning before heading elsewhere. The Covid-19 pandemic has made that even easier for me, as I am still working from home and can get out at lunch time for a quick check when the temperature has warmed up enough for many odes to be flying.

Mid-summer seems to be the best time for seeing a variety of odes at the ponds. While I have seen a few early-season species here, such as the Taiga Bluet and Spiny Baskettail, most odes that breed here don’t emerge until later in the summer. I’m not sure if the late start to spring had anything to do with it, but up until the end of June I found very few dragonflies here – skimmers are usually abundant throughout the season, but on June 30th I recorded a single Dot-tailed Whiteface and a single Twelve-spotted Skimmer along with a couple of Common Green Darners and Prince Baskettails that refused to land. Even the Eastern Forktails seemed down in numbers.

Spiketails Flying in Stony Swamp

Canadian Tiger Swallowtail

Perhaps more than Mud Lake, the one place I enjoy visiting most during migration and the summer breeding season is Stony Swamp. Pre-Covid it was always less busy than Mud Lake, especially early in the morning; however, after the pandemic hit the trails have become really popular and the parking lots are getting full before 10:00 on the weekend. If my goal is to look for birds, I try to get there before 7:00 am; but if it’s insects I’m looking for it doesn’t matter so much, as insects are not as likely to be disturbed by people, and I arrive whenever it’s convenient for me. It’s still quieter during the week than on the weekend, so I arrived at the Beaver Trail at 8:15 hoping to find some good birds as well some interesting insects as the day warmed up.

Cottage Life – Days 2 and 3

House Wren

The more you look, the more you see….this is a common theme among those of us who spend our time outdoors with a camera or binoculars, looking for birds, bugs, or just about any facet of nature. The longer a person spends searching an area, whether a quiet bay on a lake, a small urban park, one of the best-known birding hotspots in the city, or even one’s own backyard, the more species a person seems to find – whether they be colourful wildflowers, a new dragonfly or butterfly, small insects they’d never noticed before, or birds that would have been missed if they’d left after that first cursory glance. This, to me, sums up the joy of going outside – it’s a treasure hunt where, instead of targeting one specific thing, any colourful or interesting creature that catches my eye is a treasure! It’s one of the reasons I return to the same spots again and again – to see what “new treasures” might be found there. So of course when I got tired of being indoors at the cottage we rented on Prince Edward Bay in Prince Edward County, I grabbed my camera and went for a walk.

Cottage Life Day #1

Transverse-banded Flower Fly

During the first week of July my fiancé and I spent some time in Prince Edward County with my dad’s family. We rented a cottage on Loves Lane on Prince Edward Bay, a nice three-bedroom place with 8 acres of land only 20 minutes away from both Sandbanks and Picton. The weather was beautiful, and I spent most of my time getting to know the local residents. Chipping Sparrows, Song Sparrows, Red-winged Blackbirds, American Robins, Northern Flickers, Downy Woodpeckers, Eastern Kingbirds, Cedar Waxwings, a Red-eyed Vireo, and a Yellow Warbler were seen or heard around the property every day. Barn Swallows often hunted for insects above the bay, and a couple of times they even landed on the sandy bank at the edge of the swamp just beyond the cottage deck. We saw some great water birds from the deck, including an Osprey perching on the far side of the bay, a trio of Hooded Mergansers diving close by, Caspian Terns hunting for fish further out, six Mute Swans swimming by, a Common Loon that appeared in the bay twice, a mother Mallard that swam by with 11 babies in tow every morning and evening, and the occasional Green or Great Blue Heron flyby. A Merlin flew over the cottage twice, and the second time it appeared to be carrying a bird – a couple of agitated Barn Swallows were chasing it, making me think that the falcon had carried off one of their young.

Santa Rosa National Park

On May 31st Doran and I met Ollie Esquivel of Natural Discovery outside the gate at 5:30 am for our second birding outing. The best way to see lots of different birds is to visit as many different habitats as possible, so we had picked a full-day outing covering both the dry forest of the northwestern Pacific and the rainforest in the valley between Rincon de la Vieja and Cacao Volcanoes. The description on the website sounded terrific, as it promised the best combination of birding spots in Costa Rica. I was a bit worried about the weather, as afternoon showers in the rainforest are almost a given even in the dry season, and we were now over a month into the rainy season. I packed my rain gear and prepared for wet conditions, though I hoped that any showers would be light and of short duration.

When Ollie arrived I told him about the martins I had seen perching on top of the antenna on the roof at the resort, so he set up the scope and we got some great views. I also told him about the Ringed Kingfisher that perches in the trees in the large pit outside the gate, and sure enough when we looked we saw it fly by. Ollie also got me my first lifer of the day just down the road when he spotted three Crested Caracaras in the woods right next to the road. These huge falcons were on my wish list, and I was thrilled to see a couple of them together.

A Lifer Dragonfly at Pinehurst Lake

Green-striped Darner

During the third week of August I spent some time at my Dad’s trailer in the Pinehurst Lake Conservation Area near Glen Morris, Ontario. Although more of a campground/recreation area than a conservation area, it is nevertheless a great spot to spend a few days and see some “southern” wildlife. The last time I was here (August 2014) I was treated to the antics of a couple of juvenile Broad-winged Hawks, found a small pond where female Black-tipped Darners laid their eggs in the late afternoon, observed a Blue-winged Warbler on a morning walk, saw my first Red-spotted Purple butterfly, and even saw a bat near one of the washroom lights after dark. I didn’t see any Broad-winged Hawks or cool southern bird species this time, but I still ended up with 28 species over three days – the same number I saw in 2014. Here are some of the interesting creatures that I saw on my trip.

Searching for River Jewelwings

Canadian Tiger Swallowtail

On May 30th I met with Chris Traynor for a morning of bug-hunting in the west end. My main goal was to look for River Jewelwings, a damselfly that I see much less frequently than the similar-looking Ebony Jewelwing. Both of these broad-winged damselflies (genus Calopteryx) breed in the flowing waters of medium-sized creeks and streams, particularly in forested areas. While Ebony Jewelwings are most commonly found in shallow, shady streams with much emergent vegetation, River Jewelwings prefer swifter and somewhat rocky streams. There aren’t too many streams I would characterize as “rocky” in Ottawa’s west end (they are more common up in the Gatineau Hills); indeed, I have found only one stream inhabited by these colourful damselflies: Watts Creek near Shirleys Bay, on the south side of Carling Avenue. However, the bank is very steep where I have seen them – it is about a five- or six-foot vertical drop to the water, and the top of the stream bank is too thickly vegetated to walk along in order to find another spot with a shorter drop. This makes photographing them quite difficult, as they like to perch on vegetation close to the water.

Birding Southern Ontario

American Rubyspot

On Tuesday I left Dad’s trailer at Pinehurst and drove north to Kitchener, where my Mom and Step-Dad had been living since winter. I hadn’t been to their new apartment, and was interested in the birding opportunities nearby. Mom told me that there was a community trail within walking distance of their apartment, though she hadn’t been there before. We visited the trail on Wednesday, and enjoyed the walk alongside a shallow, swift-moving creek through a tangle of trees and shrubs. The riparian zone looked perfect for migrating songbirds, with lots of dense vegetation for them to find cover. There were also a few open places filled with wildflowers such as Spotted Jewelweed, goldenrod and Joe Pye Weed which looked great for butterflies and perhaps hummingbirds.

Wildlife Around Home

Eastern Cottontail

Although I haven’t been spending much time in my backyard this summer, I have spotted some interesting wildlife around. My flower garden this year seems to be a dismal failure at attracting butterflies or hummingbirds; most of the Cabbage Whites I observe keep flying over the yard rather than nectaring on any flowers, and the only other species I’ve seen lately were a Clouded Sulphur and a dark butterfly that might have been a White Admiral (I was looking out into the bright sunshine and couldn’t see it very well). Both of these were fly-overs, and spent no time investigating any of the flowers. I haven’t seen any odonates around since I noticed a female Common Whitetail in my neighbour’s front yard one day about a month ago while we were chatting.