BeccaBirding

My birding/summer adventures blog is back! Tomorrow I leave for job training on the shores of Lake Erie. I'm going to be doing flight shows and educational displays with raptors for the Canadian Raptor Conservancy. In June I'll be sent to work in Winnipeg at the Assinibione Park Zoo. My summer bird adventures started last Saturday, with an early-rising trip to Hamilton's Royal Botanical Gardens and Dundas Marsh with Alison. A beautiful male Common Yellowthroat was my first warbler of the year. We also saw lots of male and female Yellow-rumped warblers, yellow warblers, Palm warblers, a Spotted Sandpiper, lots of double-crested cormorants, Brown Creeper, and we heard a Red-bellied woodpecker. Later, in the gardens, we had a Sharp-shinned hawk fly by us, a male Black-throated Blue Warbler show of very closely for us, and encountered ... read more

So last week I mentioned that I went into the Pacific Ocean. To expand, I took an afternoon trip to Miracle Beach, which is on the Straight of Georgia, between Vancouver Island and mainland BC. It was really cool to go to a marine beach, especially one so full of life. The beaches in this area of the Island are famous for their oysters, which I got to hold, but put back because each oyster is actually layers and layers of oysters living on top of each other. I hope I get to experience another marine area before I leave. ... read more

I've been at Mountainaire Avian Rescue Society for almost two weeks. I'd say that, on average, I spend 75% of my day cleaning things for animals and 25% of my day preparing food and medicine for animal. There is also a tiny bit of filling out forms. It is pretty awesome and I wish I had more time here. MARS takes in all kinds of birds and small mammals for rehabilitation. They kind-of specialize in rehabbing eagles, of which we currently have three. There are two Red-tailed Hawks and one Barred Owl that are permanent residents and act as ambassadors to the public. I am working with them and have a presentation with the owl on Thursday. What animals we have changes every day, with rescues, releases, and, yes, deaths. The pictures are just of some ... read more

After a long absence, I am back! I'm going to catch this blog up on my June and July, and keep it up-to-date on my new adventure, which takes place across the country! I am going to... Drumroll.... ...Courtenay, British Colombia to do wildlife rehabilitation! My flight is about to board, but I will write again soon, so keep an eye on this blog and let people know it's active again!... read more

Okay, so I know I am pretty behind in updating this blog regarding my second week in Ithaca, but before I catch up on that I want to "blog" about yesterday and today. Yesterday I woke up at 5 am to catch a 7am flight to Toronto. Got in at noon and went home to see family and re-pack for two months at Long Point Bird Observatory. Drove to Guelph to meet up with Drew, who was my ride to Long Point. Played a game of dreidel with Drew-made applesauce and Amish-made donuts. After we figured out that we had a dreidle "loaded" towards the letter "nun" we just started eating the food and stopped trying to spin the dreidel on to any other letter. Then we did errands and stopped by to visit my former ... read more