DARE TO BIRD

So, I looked at the weather forecast and saw that Wed Sept 16th looked perfect for migrating hawks. It was 21 C and not a cloud in the sky. I felt like it would be a great chance to see Broad-wingeds and the much rarer Swainson's Hawk. I was birding with Ed Yong a Pulitzer price science writer who has written 3 books on birding and who was speaking on his latest book " Life beyond Measure " at UBC on Thursday . I asked him if he wanted to come along for a hawk watch and he did! He wanted to interview me for his upcoming 4th book, which was really touching. The day before I was looking at Sharp-tailed Sandpiper at Iona and ran into Conor and told him I would be going up for a hawk watch and he asked to join and I said sure the more the merrier! He brought his friend Jack and so 6 of us were up there. We arrived around 11 am and it was super slow. I started to think maybe I was wrong on my prediction as it was super warm and no clouds. However, we did have some good passeri...

On Sunday Sept 6-2026, Nathan Hentze found a second cycle dark morph Red-Footed Booby on Race Rocks in Victoria. This was during an Eagle Wing x Rocky Point Bird Observatory trip. I used to take the young birders on trips to Race Rocks. One of the first ever pelagic trips I did with them was to there and we had a Red Phalarope and all 3 species of Jaegers. You can read about that trip here . I went along with some friends and chartered a boat and we saw the bird. The weather was gorgeous and the seas were flat calm. I missed the only other rare birds on the trip, some Sabine’s Gulls but all of my focus was on the Red-footed Booby (RFBO). I have seen thousands of these birds before in Hawaii but I never tire of them. Hawaii has mostly white morphs but you do see dark morphs there too. There are more dark morphs in Mexico and the Galapagos. This bird likely came from Mexico due to the El Niño that is currently happening. We have had a huge influx of Sulids in BC and WA because of it incl...

I was honoured to have two of my photos featured in The National Audubon Society’s 2027 Mini Hummingbird Calendar . This calendar is for sale wherever Calendars are sold and on the Audubon website and on Amazon Canada . My Buff-tailed Coronet I shot in Ecuador is featured for the month of October and my Bee Hummingbird photographed in Cuba is featured for February and on the back of the calendar. It is a true honour! The cover of the 2027 Audubon Society Hummingbirds Mini Calendar The back of the calendar has my Bee Hummingbird featured to the left  My photo of a Buff-tailed Coronet from Ecuador is featured for October. This photo of a Bee Hummingbird is featured for February

We had a nice young birder trip at Cypress Bowl on the weekend. You can read our trip report HERE   on the BC Young Birders website. Young Birders on Cypress Mountain - Photo: Kalin Ocana

This summer I went off to Portugal, Spain and Norway. I first flew to Faro via Dublin.  I was going to spend a week in the Algarve region of Southern Portugal. It was very balmy and warm when I got off the plane. I stayed in a town called Albufeira. I was a bit worried about all the alarm about Europe running out of fuel due to the war in Iran but thankfully had no issues. At my hotel I was surprised by just how many birds I was able to see on the hotel grounds. There was White Wagtails, Yellow-legged Gulls, the cool looking Common Hoopoes, Iberian and Eurasian Magpies, Eurasian Kestrels, curious Eurasian Jays, Cattle Egrets eating the noisy Iberian Water Frogs, Western House-Martins, Eurasian Blackbirds, elegant looking Spotless Starlings, European Red-rumped Swallows, Eurasian Linnets, European Greenfinches and Sardinian Warblers singing constantly. I really enjoyed watching the beautiful Iberian Magpies as they travelled in small flocks and made a noisy ruckus. They like all j...