Some Superior birds

There was a good mix of birds in Peninsula Harbour this morning. Horned Larks and Rusty Blackbirds were new arrivals. The only shorebird present was a Semipalmated Plover.

As I photographed a flock of Horned Larks, a young Sharp-shinned Hawk scattered the group and engaged one bird in an erratic, twisting chase just off shore. The Horned Lark eluded the accipter, which flew back to shore and landed about 6 m. from where I was sitting. Nice.

There also were several high-flying, southbound flock of Canada Geese, totaling ~120 birds. A lone Snow Ross's Goose accompanied one of the "V"s (thank you, Alan Wormington, for the correction).

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Western Kingbird at Marathon

I swung by the boat launch in Jellicoe cove this afternoon to look for shorebirds. While I panned my binoculars across the open water a songbird flew across my field of view and landed about 50 m. away.

Western Kingbird! My first in Ontario.

It flitted about on the wind-buffeted rocks and shrubs for about ten minutes before it flew northwards along the rocky shoreline.

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More shorebirds

As seen at Penn Lake and in Peninsula Harbour on Sept 5th and 6th

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Buff-breasted Sandpiper (one of four birds present)

Buff-breasted Sandpiper (one of four birds present)

Least Sandpiper

Stilt Sandpiper and Lesser Yellowlegs at Penn Lake

Baird's Sandpiper

Sunrise at the mouth of the Pic River

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Milbert's Tortoiseshell

This colourful Nymphalid basked in the sun on a log at Port Munroe, just west of Marathon, this afternoon.

More on the species here.

Buff-breasted Sandpiper at Marathon (updated Sept. 3)

Not far from the rocky point where I encountered the Baird's Sandpiper last week, I found this Buff-breasted Sandpiper this morning. Migrating Buff-breasted Sanpipers are more typically found in drier, more upland habitats.

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Update: Sept. 3.

I relocated the bird just down the beach from where I found it yesterday. The waypoint is 48.72327, -86.38535.

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Baird's Sandpiper at Marathon

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One of the less common Calidris shorebirds we see on the north shore, this Baird's Sandpiper briefly visited the rocks beside the boat launch in Peninsula Harbour this afternoon.

Watching fish in Lake Superior

Matt Jackson shared these great shots of a school of 200-300 fish he encountered in Pukaskwa National Park. Matt wrote:

I was actually snorkeling in Horseshoe Bay when I encountered them. I swam from shore out to the small island that is about 300-400 metres off shore, and on my way back I encountered them along one of the underwater cliffs on the north side of the bay. I started following them and managed to stay with them for perhaps five minutes. They weren't moving all that fast.

Matt added that the fish were about eight inches long. The shape, colouration, behavior and presence of an adipose fin are characteristic of the whitefish/cisco/lake herring subfamily (coregoninae), of which a handful of species are known from the waters off Pukaskwa. Without a specimen in hand, my best guess is that these are juvenile Lake Herring, also called cisco, (Coregonus artedi).

Water temperatures in Lake Superior are very high this summer.

Thanks for sharing the great photos Matt.

Southbound shorebirds

Solitary Sandpiper in Marathon

Lesser Yellowlegs at Coldwell

A few southbound shorebirds have been seen around Marathon in the last week. Several Least Sandpipers were resting at the boat launch in Jellicoe Cove.

Summer Long-tailed Duck

I came upon this male Long-tailed Duck swimming among recently fledged Herring Gulls on July 13, about a kilometre north of the town boat launch - an area in which we typically see the species in the winter.