All About the Birds--Canada Edition

One just shouldn’t travel without their binoculars.  Luckily, I didn’t.  Of course, being a birder, one does travel with purpose.  In Canada, there were birds to be seen at every venue.



 

We noticed that there were several communities where houses were placed to attract and provide shelter for particular species.  In Golden, BC, we found a house near the airstrip housing a Tree Swallow.

 

 

Again, the community of Brule, AB placed a number of houses and nearly every one was occupied by Tree Swallows.  We concluded this must be a specific conservation effort.

Did you know that the Canadian Dollar is known as the Loonie?  Common Loons are found on the lakes and ponds all over Canada.



One of the birds everyone and every piece of literature told us for who to look was Barrow’s Goldeneye.  We found a hen and her brood on a quiet roadside pond.

 

Clark’s Nutcrackers are not shy around people.  This one was found at Lake Louise.

 

Finally, Hinton, AB has developed a system of trails that wander through beaver ponds.  On the main pond sat a Ring Necked Duck and his mate.



Our Two Favorite Canadians

We have just returned from a wonderful trip to Canada.  We spent time in Alberta and British Columbia.  The target place was Jasper National Park, but we found Yoho National Park to be fabulous as well.  Actually, there are many places that should be visited because there is so much to see and experience.

One wish was to see some Grizzlies in the wild.  We spent may days actively searching in areas where there were said to be.  When we were not able to find them, we became quite depressed and were about to resign ourselves to having failed.  However, the owner of the Blue Diamond B&B in Brule suggested we take the road from Hinton to Cadomin stating that one could see many different animals on that road.  Once again, we arrived at Cadomin without seeing any grizzlies.  We did see many other animals.  On our way back to Brule, we noticed another vehicle pulled over stopped.  About that time, I spied exactly what were the objects of their attention.  Success! Sweet success!

The one on the left was very wary and wanted to move on.  However the one on the right was of the stand your ground variety.  We watched for a good long time never leaving the car.  The bears may not have been grinning, but we were.

Golden Mantle in Canadian Rockies

On our recent trip to Alberta, Canada we found this little guy.  It's a Golden Mantle Ground Squirrel and was all over the talus slope rocks near the trail to Consolation Lake (one of our many hikes).

This is just a taste of the excellent time we experienced.  More will follow.