December 08, 2022
You know, I can apologize till the cows come home, but it won’t change the fact that I am once again extremely tardy in getting my blog out to you. That being said, I am sorry.
At least we know that August was a lot warmer than we are getting now, and the wildlife was out enjoying themselves as much as we were.
Most of the time we hung around Holiday Beach and made full use of our annual pass. So what did we end up seeing?
Hiding out in the greenery was what appears to be a Lake Erie Water Snake. We’ve seen them before, but it’s always nice to see a snake in the wild.
Turtles really enjoy getting out and sunning themselves on the warm summer days and August saw them out in full force. I originally thought that we only had Painted Turtles, Snapping Turtles and Blanding’s Turtles, but I have since found out that we also have Map Turtles at Holiday Beach as well. Not bad for a small portion of Southwestern Ontario.
August brought out the Butterflies in droves. Sadly I don’t know Butterflies well, but so many of them are very pretty and will occasionally sit still once in a while to allow us to take photos.
The birds are quite hungry and they are fattening up for the outbound migration. We were very entertained by a Flycatcher who played with what looks like a hornet, before eventually finishing it off.
Did you know that the birds change their looks as the Summer wears on? In the Spring when they arrive they are often sporting their beautiful breeding plumage, but after they get to their breeding grounds and have their babies they begin going through molting where they lose the pretty colours and put on the more drab outfits that makes it a bit more difficult to identify as they head back out of the area.
At one point we kept our eyes on a few ducks that we originally misidentified, and later learned that they were molting Wood Ducks. They still looked very nice, but not their striking colouring that we love.
This is also the time that we get more of the different Herons taking up residence. Most of the time we see Blue Herons and Great Egrets, but it’s always a welcome site to find the Black Crowned Night Herons and Green Herons enjoying all the goodies that the wetlands provide.
We had a special Gull stop by in Essex County for a few days and many of our birding friends went to see it, so we decided to try to find it as well. The first day we saw all kinds of Gulls, Terns and Cormorants, but not the bird we were looking for. Then it rained and we scooted out of the area.
I went back the next morning and fortunately was able to find the Franklin’s Gull relatively easily as it was right out along the edge of the sand spit across from the park where we were the day before. It was interesting to see all the other Gulls giving it a wide berth as it wandered around the area.
What’s the chance of seeing 2 types of Cuckoos in the same month? Probably not very good. However that is exactly what happened to us in August. Early in the month we had a quick sighting of the Yellow-Billed Cuckoo, and then near the end we were thrilled to watch a Black-Billed Cuckoo at Point Pelee for well over 10 minutes. Took far too many photos that all seemed to look similar in hindsight, but was exciting at the time.
One evening My Lady and I took a river cruise along the Detroit River from Windsor up as far as Peche Island and back down underneath the Ambassador Bridge. It was a very pleasant evening and a lovely date night for the old married couple. Afterwards we drove half hour to get home and promptly fell asleep.
The following morning we got up and jumped in the car and drove out to St. Thomas for a day. Went to see the Train Museum and take a walk along the Elevated Park trail. It was such a nice day that we carried on to Pinafore Park for a walk.
So guess what, that wraps up August, but a bit of good news, I have a bit more time now and can expect to get September’s blog out soon. Not tomorrow, but… soon.
Ok, how about these Eagle photos. Very rare to have it take off and fly towards you.
Thanks for sticking around and we hope that you are still enjoying our stories.
Till next time.
Tails From The Bird House 