Exploring Kootenay Lake

This is a first for me: the first owl I have managed to find on my own. In the past someone else had to point one out to me. Well, truth be known, I had a bit of help on this occasion from some irate birds, but I am willing to take full credit.

The Northern Pygmy Owl is unusual in that it is our smallest owl, it is substantially confined to the western cordillera, and it is active during the day. It will merely sit in a tree and wait for lunch to come along.

In addition to the portrait on the right, I include three more pictures of this morning’s visitor: two are shots of it in the tree where chickadees had tried unsuccessfully to chase it off; finally, there is a detail from the image on the right.

The Kootenay-Lake Website offers more pictures and discussion of local owls.

In a contest for the most beautiful local bird, the Varied Thrush would certainly be among the finalists.

The Varied Thrush, a bird of the western cordillera, is more common around the Lake in spring and summer than in fall and winter. More information and pictures of local thrushes are found on the Kootenay Lake website.

Yet it is also one of our most difficult birds to approach or photograph. Unlike its cousin the robin, it is skittish. If it knows you are in the vicinity, it flies deep into a thicket and presents its backside. The trick, then, is to not let it know you are anywhere around.

My best pictures so far of this bird were taken this morning. They are of a male. I have seen the female, but she has defied all my attempts to capture her image. Ah well, in time….

Addendum: Since posting the two pictures of the male, I managed a somewhat lower quality picture of a female in the trees. It appears and is discussed below the male.

The colour of the female Varied Thrush, as seen below, is quite similar to that of the male, but black has been replaced by greyish brown. In particular, the breast band has become a mottled brown. A juvenile is similar to the female. This female has, as is often the case for all Varied Thrushes, secreted itself in a thicket.

Steller’s Jays held virtually an exclusive reign over my feeder until the temperature plummeted (see, Strictly Steller’s). The Jays are still around, but with this morning’s temperature of -15°C, two other species visited: a Varied Thrush and a Red-breasted Nuthatch (below).

So, the question is: could it have been the chilly conditions that embolden them to seek food from the feeder?

Tweet, click; tweet, click. So went my duet with a Song Sparrow from one perch to the next in this morning’s early light. The bird finally flew away, apparently finding my endless clicking an inadequate counterpoint for its own beautiful voice.

I am sure that when a Bohemian Waxing encounters a genuine birder, it alights nearby and allows a closeup photograph. With me, waxwings always arrive in great numbers at the top of a distant tree, flutter about for a while, decide that I am clearly unworthy and leave.

The Bohemian Waxwing is a winter bird around here. Others have been reporting it for some time, but I didn’t see any until this morning near Sitkum Creek where I played cat and mouse: I arrive, they leave; I move, they move. Well, that is just how waxwings behave: arrive in great numbers, start flying from branch to branch and if enough neighbours join in, take off for somewhere else and start all over again.

The Kootenay Lake website offers more pictures and a discussion of waxwings.

Some of their frenetic activity is evident in the three pictures below where at any given moment, a fair fraction of them are in the air merely flying to adjacent branches.

I am always impressed with the number and variety of species of waterfowl to be found at the Nelson’s waterfront. Why are the numbers and diversity so much greater there than elsewhere along the West Arm of the Lake?

Of late the big population at Nelson’s Duck Bay is Greater Scaups. Certainly there are other species around—Buffleheads, Canada Geese, Ring-necked Ducks, Mallards—but, numbers are dominated by scaups.

The scaup is a diving duck, indeed it gets its name from the Scots name for a bed of mussels, a favourite feeding ground for it there.

The Kootenay Lake website offers other pictures and a discussion of diving ducks.

Often one sees waterfowl just hanging out: floating along, each with its bill tucked under a wing. But, watching them today was great fun for they were on the move, if only from one part to the bay to another.

A male (lower right) and two female Greater Scaups. The female shows more brown and has white on its face.

Two female scaups about to land on the lake and one male (right) already down.

A female scaup landing on water.

A male scaup planes across the water surface.

Birders around the area are beginning to report a variety of birds at their feeders: nuthatches, chickadees, goldfinches, robins, flickers, finches, siskins, waxwings—the list goes on.

Not me. My feeder has been taken over by local mobsters: Steller’s Jays. I have heard Black–capped Chickadees and seen Varied Thrushes and Robins in the area, but the intimidating presence at the feeder belongs to the Jays, which arrive in numbers each morning.

The Kootenay-Lake Website offers more pictures and discussions of local Steller’s Jays.

So, what does one do in the face of this clear display of avian muscle? Why, take pictures, of course.