DARE TO BIRD

We had a fantastic trip with 8 youth today in the Coquihalla Summit area. We spent 8 hours on the mountain and hiked 14.5 km, it was a challenging but very beautiful hike! Our mission was to search for White-tailed Ptarmigan. It started off very foggy and then once we got to the top the fog cleared and the sun came out showing us beautiful views, all around us! It sure was rewarding after the long hike. The youth were troopers through it all. We hiked to a beautiful alpine lake under the peak of Flatiron and saw many animals during the day including Pika, Hoary Marmots, Red Squirrel, Golden-mantled Ground Squirrels and Yellow-Pine Chipmunks. We had such a fantastic time together telling stories and laughing the whole day through. The Youth all worked together scouring large areas for the Ptarmigan. We did not end up seeing any White-tailed Ptarmigan but did find fresh scat and feathers so we knew they were in the area. We ended up with great birds today regardless. The species ...

We took a Zodiak out of Sooke with ten kids and went in search of Jaegers, Shearwaters etc. The year before but in October Ilya Povalyaev, Guy Monty, Carlo Giovanella, Peter Candido, Ann Nightingale and Kim Beardmore went out on 2 boats in search of the Brown Booby. Ann was doing her VI big year at the time. We never did see the Brown Booby but we ended up with Pomarine and Parasitic Jaegers, Red-necked Phalaropes, Northern Fulmars, Heermann's Gulls, Cassin's and Rhino Auklets, Marbled and Ancient Murrelets, Pink-footed and Sooty Shearwaters. It was a great day. We hoped we would replicate it even though it was Sept but unfortunately the weather was too good. It was too warm and still with no wind and not a single tubenose was in sight. A Tufted Puffin was seen by a few on board and we saw over 20 Humpback Whales which was really impressive for the kids. We also saw California Sea Lions at a nearby den. We went as far as Port Renfrew and turned back. Sometimes the whales were ...