Cottage Visit

 June 10-13, 2021

We headed up for lunch on Thursday, stopping to photograph a Ruffed Grouse on Chemin du Lac à L'Arche.

We uncovered the boat and evicted a Mallard from the dock.

On Friday, we decided to do a circuit of our birding spots, which included the creek at Blue Sea, Chemin Galipeau, Farley, Maniwaki and Chemin des Eaux.

At almost the same spot as the Ruffed Grouse, we came upon Dale trying to protect a nesting Snapping Turtle.  He left his umbrella on the road to warn other motorists.

Then it was off to Blue Sea Creek.  We saw a Red-winged Blackbird, Hooded Merganser, Song Sparrow, Swamp Sparrow and an incredible 2 Virginia Rails.

At Chemin Galipeau, a Gray Catbird was singing up a storm, but refused to give us anything but a glimpse.

Our next stop was at the uncut fields in Farley, where a Bobolink came to our call.

Moving along to the edge of the reserve, we got a Chestnut-sided Warbler and Common Yellowthroat.

We drove through Kitigan Zibi noting all the many orange shirts in memory of the Kamloops children's graves that were discovered.  We went through Maniwaki to Egan Sud and Langevin Construction, one of our secret places.  The first bird  we saw was a Brown Thrasher, at first mistaken for a thrush.

We ate our lunch and birded around the creek.  We kept hearing Warbling Vireos singing and finally saw some which posed for photos... Except all of the photos were of Red-eyed Vireos!

We also saw a Yellow Warbler and a pair of American Redstarts.

We followed this with a tour on Chemin des Eaux.  The farm fields by the Gatineau River are excellent for Bobolinks, Thrashers, Meadowlarks (no photo) and sparrows.

Finally, it was time to head back to the lake.  The next day, Bill went on another fruitless fishing outing, but was ale to see a Bald Eagle at the nest.  This was good news, as the previous time, the nest was unattended.

When he got back in, we loaded up the bikes and headed to Farley to bike along the trail to Messines and back.  It was a quiet time for birds until we got to the ponds where the lady nearly drowned last year when she fell off her bike into the water (Brenda and I pulled her out).  We got both types of White-throated Sparrows, a Yellow-rumped Warblers and a Chestnut-sided too.

Bill spotted a Broad-winged Hawk being chased by two Red-winged Blackbirds.

When we biked back to the car, a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker was going back and forth.

The next morning, we went for a canoe ride right after breakfast and passed a Northern Water Snake.

We entered the creek and made our way around the partially fallen trees into an inner lagoon.  Birds were singing, but it took us a minute to recognize a Willow Flycatcher. Soon it posed for us.

Common Yellowthroats and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks were also singing up a storm.

We paddled back and Bill took the boat out front in our bay to try for trout.  Once again, there were many showing on the depth finder, but they were not inclined to bite,.  A Common Loon and young Double-crested Cormorant provided photo diversions.

There were lots of interesting birds to see over the four days.