Notes from Bird Studies Canada Annual Meeting

We attended the Bird Studies Canada (BSC) Annual General meeting last week in Port Rowan.
There was, of course, lots of dry but necessary reporting. But some exciting stuff as well.
The feature presentation came from Dr. Doug Tozer on BSC’s  Lakes Loon Survey  that is now in its 33rd year.  The database for this work is large encompassing  4,550 lakes and 25,000 breeding pairs, I believe. (http://www.birdscanada.org/volunteer/clls/resources/CLLSsummary.pdf)

The work, which looks at loon chicks as reported by volunteers across the country, reveals how our lakes are doing.  Probably because of mercury pollution and acid rain eastern loon chicks aren’t doing that well.  While still producing at levels that will maintain decent populations, birth rates are going down. 

Meanwhile, loon reproduction does much better in Western Canada but these reproduction rates are going down considerably faster than in the east.  I’m not a scientist but what I get from the research is that mercury and maybe acid rain continue to have an effect on our lakes even after their prevalence in the atmosphere has been reduced.  More research is needed.

An exciting development is a $3.5 million dollar research project that will use new technologies to study migratory routes of birds and bats.  BSC President and CEO George Finney briefly described the project in his remarks.
Scientists from Western, Guelph and Acadia  have come together on this.  You can read an undated description of the project written by Mitchell Zimmer at http://www.uwo.ca/sci/news/silent_seasons.html

Zimmer quotes biologist Chris Gugliemo:

“The big overarching goal of this is a twenty year commitment to link all of Canada’s birds to their migration and wintering areas to create a migration atlas which doesn’t exist anywhere in the world.”

In the article, Guigliemo notes that some species have an 80% mortality rate during their extended migration.

“(Y)et those flights are largely a black box. Where do the birds go on their way south, where do they stop to rest and refuel, why do they die?”

The research is important to learn more about species at risk and also climate change.

As I said, this is exciting stuff.

Learn about Dragonflies

Here is an event in our back yard of which we’ve just become aware.
It is one-day course designed to educate and train participants about the conservation, ecology, and life history of dragonflies.

It is being put on by Migratory Dragonfly Partnership.

According to the Partnership’s website, “Dragonfly migration is one of the most fascinating events in the insect world, but also one of the least-known.”

The Migratory Dragonfly Partnership is composed of dragonfly experts, nongovernmental programs, academic institutions, and federal agencies from the U.S., Mexico, and Canada. Together, they are combining research, citizen science, and education and outreach to better understand North America's migrating dragonflies and promote conservation of their wetland habitat.

Participants will be trained to become citizen science contributors for the Migratory
Dragonfly Partnership's North America-wide citizen science research projects.

The course, which is free, will run Saturday September 28th from 10:00 AM to 4:30 PM EDT at the Long Point Bird Observatory/Bird Studies Canada.  They’re located just west of beautiful Port Rowan Harbour at 115 Front Rd in Port Rowan.

You can find out lots of details on the event and dragonflies at http://events.r20.constantcontact.com/register/event?oeidk=a07e82tceaj9a685417&llr=tnjebhdab

Labour Day Weekend in Port Rowan

This was the first year we’ve been around Port Rowan for Bayfest weekend.  Originally called Tomato Fest the event highlights the tomato that was packed and processed here in great numbers at Innes Foods from 1963 – 1981.  According to Down by the Bay A History of Long Point and Port Rowan,   local farmers delivered trailers with up to four tons of tomatoes to the plant.   At the plant on the western edge of Port Rowan, the hand-picked field grown vegetables were canned in four hours.  A large parade and fireworks are among highlights of Bayfest



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Lisa "longball" Vlooswyk drills a 300 yarder.

We were surprised when we moved here that Port Rowan hosted a Canadian Championship.  That would be the Long Drive Championships http://www.internationallongdrivechallenge.com/canadian_nationals.html which is now part of the Labour Day weekend festivities.    We caught the Women’s Final at Stark’s Golf Course where Burlington’s Fareen Samji defended her championship in a close contest over seven time champion Lisa “Longball” Vlooswyk.  Many drives over 300 yards were recorded in the Sunday final.

On the birding front things were  slow at the old Cut Banding Station but staff tell us they should pick up when the cold front comes in later this week.  My niece did get the opportunity on Sunday to hold a Wilson’s Warbler after it had been banded.   


Wilson's Warbler