Ottawa Area Birding

Thursday, October 22, 2026

Diamond Jubilee & Findlay Creek Strom Ponds plus Conroy Greenbelt Pathway with JC Birding

October 22, 2026

Birding Report by Jane Burgess

Today Thursday, Bill, Barbara, and I joined Ann G at the Diamond Jubilee Pond. Ann has been there many times and so we assigned her the job of leader. Good place to go, first ducks we saw were Hooded Merganser (females) and then we saw 2 Pied-billed Grebes playing. So we walked around the pond to see them close up. Oh we saw a beautiful male Hooded Merganser and then 2 more females.

While walking around the pond, we saw a Canada Goose by itself. It looked smaller, so I asked Bill,look at that goose, is it smaller? We were unsure if it was a Cackling Goose. We took photos just to be sure, and yes it was a Cackling Goose. We saw a couple of Lesser Scaup, I think 1 male and a couple of females. The 2 Pied-billed Grebes were joined by 5 more grebes.

Ann asked if we would like to go to Findlay Creek Stormwater Pond, yes of course, we had not been there. My, my so many American Robins. But the star was the Belted Kingfisher. There were also many European Starlings and Red-winged Blackbirds. The habitat was excellent for these guys, lots of seeds to eat before they head south.

Then Ann suggested we go to the E\W Conroy Path because there had been a Northern Shrike reported (Christine Cote) there in the last few days. We walked the path, we did not see much until we ran into Christine. We chatted a bit and off Christine went, then she called us, she had heard the Northern Shrike - quite honestly I have no idea what a Shrike sounds like, of course I had checked it out later. Yes we saw it, it was far and it flew closer but still far. Good bird.

Ann left us at this point and joined Christine. We continued, Christine said there had been 25 or so Pine Siskin. We walked on and heard a Pileated Woodpecker. We went to the small bridge and played the mobbing tape, absolutely nothing. So we turned around and started back to the car. A Great Blue Heron flew over, quite low, had we not looked up we would never have seen it. So quiet. Walking back we heard more and more American Robins, they must be going through.

Bill look at those small birds - Goldfinch, no Pine Siskin, we saw about 10 of them. Glad to see them.

It was a short day home shortly before lunch.