Ontario Nature Blog

Winter and birding seem like an unlikely pair. “What is there to see in the winter?” people often ask. The truth is that winter in southern Ontario offers some extravagant avian rewards. What better remedy is there for the winter blues than the sight of a bufflehead gliding across frigid Lake Ontario and flaunting his ...

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The early bird gets the worm, or at least that’s what they say. This past weekend I found myself awake and watching the bird feeders at my family’s home in Coldwater, Ontario before the birds arrived. It was a cold and rainy morning – maybe that’s why they were late to begin their seed and ...

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I frequently visit the Carden Plain Important Bird Area in the Kawarthas to photograph the many birds that pass through there during spring and fall migration. Having read that it was difficult to photograph the eastern loggerhead shrike – a critically endangered species in Canada – I was intrigued by a captive breeding and release program ...

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It’s not often that birding becomes an adventure sport, but some birds are worth chasing. And by chasing, I mean sliding through mud, crossing creeks and coming home slightly battered and dirty. But there’s a pride to showing-off the scrapes and bruises acquired in the pursuit of an elusive bird.

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As our cold long winter finally came to an end, the bird sounds outside my window enticed me to get outside and observe the early spring migration. On-line bird forums informed me that spring migrants such as red-winged blackbirds, white-throated sparrows, tundra swans and sandhill cranes were beginning to arrive. At the end of March, ...

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