Dick Cannings: Birds and Books

From 2001 to 2009 I had the honour to sit on COSEWIC–the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada–as the bird co-chair.  COSEWIC has about 40 members; half of them nominated by jurisdictions (provinces, territories, the federal government) and half representing species groups (e.g. mammals, birds, fish, vascular plants).  There are also two members representing the aborginal traditional knowledge committee.  COSEWIC has a mandate to assess the status of Canadian wildlife species and advise the federal government as to which should be listed under the Species at Risk Act.

White-headed Woodpecker: Endangered

At my first COSEWIC meeting I was impressed by a number of things.  First, the amount of knowledge and commitment in the room was truly amazing.  Secondly, all the members voted and discussed all the species on the agenda, so there was a consistency in the approach across a wide variety of animals and plants.  Thirdly, a two-thirds majority was needed to pass a motion on status, so something approaching consensus had to be achieved for each species.  Sometimes this took an hour or more of spirited discussion, but in almost all cases everyone felt that the right decision had been made.  I was also heartened to see that jurisdictional representatives (as they are directed to do) had “left their jurisdictional hats at the door”, engaging in discussions and presumably voting based on  their own knowledge and expert opinion, not that of their employers.

Western Screech-Owl, interior subspecies:  Endangered

COSEWIC meetings were a lot of work–I had to get 5 or 10 bird status reports ready for the committee, then read the 30 to 60 status reports from other species groups so that I could engage properly in the discussions or voting.  But I thoroughly enjoyed the sessions and learned a great deal about mosses, whales, mussels, and the country that I live in.  I still sit on the COSEWIC bird subcommittee, so help out in the preparation and editing of the bird status reports.  And I look forward to getting news from the spring and fall species assessment meetings to see which species are in trouble, and occasionally, which species are in better shape than they were a decade ago.

Sage Thrasher: Endangered

COSEWIC reports promptly on its findings, both to the public and to the federal government.  The government must decide whether to accept COSEWIC’s recommendations on species status, or whether to leave a species off the Species At Risk Act because of socioeconomic reasons.  This relationship creates some tension between COSEWIC and the government, but at least the decisions by both parties are open to public scrutiny.

I’ve summarized below the bird results from the latest COSEWIC species assessment meeting held in late November.  If you’d like the full report from that meeting, click here.  COSEWIC has now assessed a total of 631 Canadian taxa at some level of risk, as well as 171 taxa that were deemed not at risk and 49 species for which there simply wasn’t enough information for assessment.  For a full listing of all these assessments, click here.

Barn Owl:   The Barn Owl occurs in two widely separated populations in Canada, a western population in southwestern British Columbia, and an eastern population in extreme southern Ontario.  The western population was reassessed as Threatened, up from its former status as Special Concern, because of loss of habitat through urbanization and intensification of agriculture.  The eastern population, which consists of only 5 or 10 pairs at most, remains as Endangered.

White-headed Woodpecker:  This woodpecker, one of Canada’s most-wanted species by birders, was reassessed as Endangered.  The main concern for this species in Canada is its small range and population (restricted largely to the south Okanagan valley with only a few reports each year) and habitat degradation through past logging activity, high forest fire threat and loss of mature ponderosa pines to pine beetles.

Sage Thrasher:  The Sage Thrasher is found in the south Okanagan valley in British Columbia and in extreme southeastern Alberta and southwestern Saskatchewan.  Both populations are small and are faced with habitat loss.

Cerulean Warbler:  This warbler is found in areas of undisturbed hardwood forests in southern Ontario and Quebec; fewer than 1000 breed in the country.  Cerulean Warbler populations are declining rapidly across their range and the situation seems to be worsening; it was uplisted from Special Concern to Endangered.

Most of us learned about the Ancient Mariner in high school English, but I imagine that few were taught about the Ancient Murrelet.  These small auks breed in huge numbers along the Pacific coast, primarily in Haida Gwaii, the Queen Charlotte Islands.  They nest in burrows dug into the ground beneath the huge spruce, hemlocks and cedars.  Ancient Murrelets differ from most other auks in that they lay two eggs, not one.  The young birds are precocial upon hatching and usually leave the nest within two days of hatching.  Nest-leaving–which always happens at night–is a remarkable process.  The parents call at the burrow entrance and are answered by the chicks; the parents then lead them out of the burrow and down towards the sea.  The adults then fly to the sea and call for the young, which scramble through the forest giving wee-wee calls in answer to their parents’ chirrups.  This can be quite a sight when many young are leaving burrows in a large colony simultaneously.  Once on the water, the young and adults continue calling, finding each other through their familiar voices.  I remember one night kayaking off a small island in Haida Gwaii, when the water was alive with bioluminescence and the bay covered with murrelet chicks peeping to find their parents.

The birds gradually move away from the colonies, and many are seen in October and November in British Columbia coastal waters as they disperse southwards.  Then, sometimes rather abruptly, they leave the coastal waters and presumably spend the rest of the winter in the open Pacific.  It is at this time, in late October and November, that a few wayward murrelets can show up in the Interior of British Columbia.  In fact, they can show up almost everywhere in North America–the Ancient Murrelet is by far the most likely of its family to appear well inland on fresh water.  These are rare events–I’ve never seen an Ancient Murrelet on freshwater in my life–but there are more than a half-dozen records from Okanagan Lake alone.  Inland occurrences also happen in the spring, but that is even more unusual.

I received a message this morning from Jennifer Smith, a local birder, who said she’d found an Ancient Murrelet dead on the beach at Penticton.  I went down there with my son Russell and found the body almost entirely covered in the thick ice that had built up on the shoreline overnight.  I chopped it out of the ice to save the specimen for the UBC vertebrate museum.

Ancient Murrelet found dead on Okanagan Lake beach, Penticton, 22 November 2010

So, with deepest apologies to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, (and yes, I know this is more or less in limerick form and not the meter that Coleridge used for is epic Rime of the Ancient Mariner, but I felt that if I was going to use this title for a blog I had to offer up some doggerel), I present this small ditty:

Ancient Murrelets are related to auks
Cousins to puffins, not hawks
They live in the ocean
But some get a notion
To fly eastward, and get quite a shock.

This one got it into his noggin
To fly to Lake Okanagan
The landing was dicy
The water was icy
And he’d forgotten to bring his toboggan.

After the long flight he was tired
And soon in the frozen shoreline was mired
He dreamed of the coast
And the islands he loved most
As he lay on the beach and expired.

The pair of Great Horned Owls woke me up again this morning, hooting from our trees.  I glanced out the window–the branches were bouncing around in the wind quite a bit.  Maybe it wasn’t a good day for a long bike ride.  I’d been hoping for one last long bicycle trip this season before the weather really shut down–to see the Northern Parula in Oliver.  I decided to get up and take a closer look at the situation.  It was 7 a.m. and still pretty gloomy outside.  I looked at the weather forecast–30 kph winds from the south, good chance of rain.  Well that settled it–probably a good day to clean the office.  I made a pot of coffee and had some toast.

When I looked up again the sun was streaming over the mountains to the east.  Patches of blue had appeared and the clouds had that innocuous we-won’t-rain-on-you look.  Suddenly the world looked like a better place to ride a bike.  The wind was still blowing, but I figured I could buck it going south to Oliver and if it got too much I could just turn around and sail home.

I was out the door by 8 a.m. and pedalling down the Okanagan River channel in Penticton.  The flocks of gulls–mostly Californias–were still in a frenzy over the kokanee spawn and a few ducks had moved in to take advantage as well–Common and Barrow’s Goldeneyes, Buffleheads, Common Mergansers and a lone Hooded Merganser.  Several skeins of Canada Geese flew in from the north overhead.  I saw them land at the airport and stopped for a scan.  No Cackling, but in their midst was a single Snow Goose; a nice bird for the Okanagan.  A Northern Shrike flew out of the field and onto a power line.  The river oxbows had a few dabblers–Mallards, Gadwalls and American Wigeon–as well as a quartet of Great Blue Herons.

I got to Skaha Lake at 8:40; about 10 minutes longer than I usually take, a combination of cycling into the wind and the good birding I guess.  I decided to take the slow but peaceful route down the west side of the lake, on the old railway trail.  It was odd to be on that trail in November–the campsites deserted, the trail surface a carpet of yellow cottonwood leaves.  A far cry from the busy summer days filled with tourists and power-boats.  The wind really picked up–blowing at least 30 kph by now as forecasted–but then it always seems to be windy along Skaha.  It let up a bit as I approached Okanagan Falls and remained light (but still in my face) for the rest of the southward leg.  I was a bit chilled by the breeze, so I stopped in at the IGA for a fresh coffee and chocolate croissant before heading south on Hwy. 97 to Vaseux Lake.  The lake was covered in waterfowl; I’d have to check that out on my return trip.

Just as I passed the south end of the lake a black car did a U-turn and pulled up next to me.  Police?  I was wearing a helmet.  The window rolled down and John Vooys, a birding friend from the Fraser Valley, called out “Do you want a ride?”  Knowing where I was headed (and I knew where he’d been–why else would a coastal birder be in the south Okanagan in November but to see the recently-discovered parula?), he simply said, “I just saw the bird, in with the flock of chickadees at campsite 3”.  “Thanks!” I replied, and the window went up and John was on his way north, perhaps to have another look at the Little Blue Heron in West Kelowna.  It was good to know the parula was still around today–my only fear in this adventure was cycling all that way only to find that the bird had taken off.

The trusty bike at Inkaneep Provincial Park–just to prove I cycled there!

Another 15 minutes of pedaling and I was there–Inkaneep Provincial Park, a lovely little patch of cottonwood and birch riparian woodland along a wildish (well, undyked) section of the Okanagan River.  It was 11 a.m., and there was a car in the parking lot–probably another birder.  I locked the bike up to a tree and began searching.  I quickly found a chickadee, but it seemed to be alone, an unusual situation for one of its kind.  I walked along the trail to the river, on the look out for a real mixed flock.  A flock of goldfinches fed noisily in the trees and a Pacific Wren chattered in the underbrush–the latter a new species for this year’s nonmotorized list at least.  I turned a corner and there was Donna Heard, a local birder from Oliver.  She was staring intently at something with her binoculars.  She heard me coming, turned and said those words that twitchers love to hear: “The bird is right here!”.  And indeed it was–a good look, too, up in the mid-canopy of a small birch.  I was hoping to get a photograph, but the parula moved on with the Black-capped Chickadees, Golden-crowned and Ruby-crowned Kinglets, and Dark-eyed Juncos that made up its flock.  Several of them crossed the river; I could still hear the warbler call occasionally but never saw it again after that first look.

Satisfied with that brief encounter and anxious to leave enough time to get home before dark, I got on the bike again and turned north.  Stopping at Vaseux Lake, I sorted through the flock of diving ducks at the south end (almost 200 Ring-neckeds as well as redheads, scaup and canvasbacks) while a couple of Canyon Wrensjinked above me on the cliff, then walked out on the boardwalk to the blind to scope the swans at the north end.  They were all Trumpeters–11 adults and 2 immatures.  A little flock of 5 Ruddy Ducks tucked into the northeast corner was a surprise.

Late afternoon sun on the vineyards and bluffs above Skaha Lake

Back in Okanagan Falls, I cycled down to the provincial park to check the river.  The dippers were back; two of them dipping in the mid-river rocks.  Then it was back on to the railway trail along Skaha Lake.  Predictably, the wind kicked up to over 30 kph again, but thankfully still from the south, so I breezed north with relative ease.  I felt so rested at Penticton that I decided to add a couple of kilometres to the trip and check the head of Okanagan River.  Just the usuals there–hundreds of California Gulls, a big flock of coots and a smattering of ducks.  I headed up the West Bench hill–the only serious hill of the trip–knowing that the hot tub was only 2 km away.  I felt surprisingly good after 80 km on the bike, the quail scattering as I came up the driveway.  Now, should I go for the Little Blue Heron tomorrow?  Mmm, no– I think I’ll wait for it to move south a few kilometres.

I’m not sure if it’s a real phenomenon or whether I’m just sensitized to the number of rare birds being reported in the last two weeks because Russell is doing his Big Year in BC, but it has been quite a November so far.  In my last post I mentioned the Northern Parula and other interesting birds around the Okanagan.  Russell drove down from Haida Gwaii (where he and his friends had found a Chestnut-sided Warbler, Brambling and other unexpected migrant goodies) overnight to see that bird, then was off to Chilliwack to look for the Northern Mockingbird and Philadelphia Vireo (!) at Island 22 (he got the mocker but dipped on the vireo).  Then just as it was getting dark yesterday I got an email from Scott Thomson with some cellphone photos of an intriguing small egret at the mouth of Powers Creek in West Kelowna.

Immature Little Blue Heron, Powers Creek, West Kelowna, 12 November 2010

It was definitely not a Cattle Egret, the normal species seen in late fall in British Columbia (as if any egret is normal here).  The neck was too long, the legs were too long, and it was wading in water up to its belly.  But what egret was it then?  Scott suggested immature Little Blue Heron, which the photos did not discount, but I put that out of my mind because it was so unlikely–there was only one previous record for the province.  Even Snowy seemed highly improbable.  Grasping at straws, I suggested that maybe it was a Great Egret that just “looked” small.

Little Blue Heron in flight, showing dark tips to the primaries and dull yellow-green legs

I phoned Chris Charlesworth of Kelowna about the sighting, so he said he’d try to get there in the morning.  I was still in bed when he called at 7 a.m. and said “Little Blue”.  I was up in a second, breakfast at Tim Horton’s, and on my way north.  I found Thor Manson at the site when I arrived and he pointed out the bird, foraging in shallow water at the creek mouth as Scott had seen it the day before.  It was a classic immature Little Blue Heron: dull yellowish legs, greyish bill with a dark tip, plumage all-white except for the dark tips to the wings.  After taking a few pictures, I noted all the other birds along the lakeshore–big flock of coots, Greater and Lesser Scaups, Redheads, Pied-billed, Horned and Western Grebes, and a Belted Kingfisher.  Nice place to be birding in the morning, with a Little Blue Heron on top of it all!

When I was coming home from Ecuador last week I was worrying about the abrupt change from tropical temperatures and diversity to the reality of November in Canada—sleet, grey skies and short days.  I certainly don’t equate November in British Columbia with nice weather and good birding, but that’s what has happened in the last few days.  Temperatures around 13°C (55°F) have made cycling a pleasure, so I’ve been down to the lakeshore and back several times.  The big raft of a thousand coots on Okanagan Lake has been augmented by a pile of Redheads and Greater Scaup, hinting at the two or three thousand Redheads that are usually here by Christmas.  Hundreds of California Gulls have gathered along the beach, attracted by the kokanee spawning run in the Okanagan River. A Peregrine Falcon has set up shop on the condo high-rise along the lakeshore, rocketing out for dinner whenever it’s hungry.

Lured by reports of Pacific Loons and a Clark’s Grebe, I scanned the shoreline for a few days, finally finding one of the loons to add to my non-motorized (NMT) year list (now standing at 187, in case you’re wondering).  A few Ruddy Ducks mixed with the coots and the flock of Common Mergansers was building at the head of the river above the outlet dam.  Yesterday I stopped by after grocery shopping to see if the grebe was around and instead saw an odd-looking duck fly in and land amongst the coots.  A Long-tailed Duck!  Now that would be good to add to the NMT list.  It was obviously being bullied by the coots and spent most of its time underwater.  As I walked back to the car I scanned the area above the dam again and there was a female Red-breasted Merganser, another local rarity.  It was obvious that a quick bike trip was on order.  I drove home, put the helmet on, and was back down the hill within 20 minutes.  No Red-breasted Merganser, no Long-tailed Duck.  The viewing conditions were perfect—late afternoon sun behind me, calm water.  I picked out two Bonaparte’s Gulls in with the Californias—that’s getting rather late.  A flock of ducks half way to Summerland had moved in closer—50 American Wigeon on their way south.  I methodically searched the big coot flock five or six times, but could only conclude the Long-tailed Duck had tired of being bullied and had taken off.  And who knew where the merganser was—it was swimming north so fast when I had seen it, it could be in Summerland by now.

News from the south end of the valley was interesting too.  Bob McKay had a very late Rufous Hummingbird at his feeder in Oliver, and when Don Cecile came to check out the hummingbird he found a bird previously unknown for the valley–a Northern Parula.  Today was cooler and showery for a change, so I thought I had better try for the Northern Parula before it figured out that it wasn’t in eastern Mexico.  I got down to the site just before noon to find fellow birders Laure Neish, Eva Durance and Lesley Robertson there.  Laure had just seen the bird, so we walked into the park and found the flock of Black-capped Chickadees it had been hanging out with.  I gave a few pish calls and a screech-owl trill and the whole gang came flitting toward us, about 10 chickadees, a couple of Ruby-crowned Kinglets, and there—the parula.  A nice looking bird with orange-yellow breast, blue-grey head and rump and a greenish back.  Rare anywhere west of Manitoba, I’d only seen one in British Columbia before.  It seemed happy and healthy despite being in totally the wrong part of the world.

Northern Parula, Oliver, BC, 9 November 2010.  Photo Eva Durance

When I got home, Laure phoned as I walked in the door.  “I think I have a Purple Finch at my feeder—I’m sending you the photo right now”, she said.  Purple Finches may be common over most of North America, but they are almost unknown from this corner of the continent.  I’d never seen one in a lifetime of birding in the Okanagan, though they are easily found on the coast at Vancouver and anywhere in central British Columbia in summer.  But here they are replaced by the very similar Cassin’s Finch.  The females—and Laure’s bird was in female plumage—differ mainly in the clean white undertail coverts of the Purple.  “Eastern” Purple Finches also have wide, white facial stripes and somewhat blurrier streaks on the breast and belly.  There was no doubt that Laure was correct in her identification.  I jumped back in the car and drove across town, finding her yard full of finches.  About 50 House Finches were hopping all over the feeders, and there on the driveway was a … a Cassin’s Finch.  Definitely not the bird in the photo though.  I sat and waited for quite a while, watching Mountain Chickadees, Red-breasted Nuthatches, Pine Siskins, Steller’s Jays, and other feeder birds come and go.  But no Purple Finch for me today.  Maybe tomorrow—November’s turning out to be an exciting month!

We reluctantly bid goodbye to Jairo and his family at Alambi Cloud Forest Lodge and drove our little car up to the village of Tandayapa, then turned left up the Paseo del Quinde to Nono.  The gravel road is in excellent condition and the scenery is glorious—steep slopes covered with lush subtropical forest, the Rio Alambi tumbling over boulders below.  As I did 20 years ago, I wished I’d had more time to bird this stretch, but we were also anxious to change geography and see what the east side of the Andes had to offer.  A few quick stops netted a lovely male Summer Tanager, a Barred Becard and a Golden-headed Quetzal.  As we approached Nono, the landscape became more cleared pastures than forest and Great Thrushes became common along the roadside.

Female Sword-billed Hummingbird, Reserva Yanacocha

Beyond Nono a Scarlet-bellied Mountain-Tanager, one of the most stunningly-coloured birds imaginable, flew across the road and allowed great views in a small tree next to us.  Then we were at the turn-off to Reserva Yanacocha, where the Fundación Jocotoco has protected a significant remnant of temperate forest on the precipitous northern slopes of Volcan Pichincha.  Yanacocha is a 10-km drive off the main road, but is worth the trip.  A broad, level trail leads around the mountain, affording great views (if it’s not foggy—early morning is best!) and wonderful birding, especially for hummingbirds.  It is the only site in the world where Black-breasted Pufflegs are seen, but this enigmatic species only appears from May to July—where it goes the rest of the year s anyone’s guess.  It’s a good thing the trail is level, since it is at an altitude of 3545 metres (11630 feet) and any exertion is more difficult than at lower levels.  We walked for a couple of kilometres before the thick fog set in.  At the first hummingbird feeder we found, a Buff-winged Starfrontlet allowed good views, but the kicker was at the second feeder—four Sword-billed Hummingbirds sparred over access to the nectar!  Bush birding was good as well—small flocks of Hooded Mountain-Tanagers foraged in the trailside trees, and we finally saw a pair of Barred Fruiteaters at close range.  We never got to the main hummingbird feeding area, deciding to retreat from the fog instead.

Marg looking at a chat-tyrant at Yanacocha

After a picnic lunch at the reserve entrance we got back in the car and continued east, getting momentarily lost in Quito but finding the tunnels that led to the central valley and onto the Carretera Oriental to Papallacta and beyond.  The highway climbed out of the suburbs, through a short section of potato fields and into open pasture land as we approached Papallacta Pass.  We drove over the pass (just over 4000 m/13,000 feet elevation), deciding to stop there on our return to Quito.

The road wound down the east slope of the mountains, from grassy paramo, past patches of Polylepis forest (couldn’t see any easy places to stop for Giant Conebills) and into scrubby temperate forests above the village of Papallacta.  The trees quickly got bigger as the road went lower, and within a few minutes we were at Guango Lodge, nestled in a narrow valley along the Rio Papallacta at about 9000 ft (2700 m) elevation.

The Chevy Spark at Guango Lodge

Guango is another Ecuadorian lodge where hummingbirds are a star attraction.  The feeders are dominated by Chestnut-breasted Coronets, admittedly more handsome than their Buff-tailed cousins but with the same habit of lifting their wings high over their backs on landing.  Second in numbers were Tourmaline Sunangels, the males looking fabulous in basic black with stunning blue, green and amethyst throats, the more demur females with a white throat.  Sword-billed Hummingbirds are regular here too, looking a bit awkward as they direct their ridiculously long bills into the feeders.  White-bellied Woodstars (it was Purple-throated at Alambi), and Long-tailed Sylphs (with bluer and longer tails than the west-slope Violet-tailed Sylphs) are also common.

Guango has lots of good trails.  I took one down to the river and found a pair of Torrent Ducks hauled out on a big boulder in midstream.  We walked that trail the next morning and surprised a Fasciated Tiger-Heron—apparently the first record for Guango—off its rocky perch.  This species likes these rushing streams, but is usually found at more moderate elevations.  The forest trails were a goldmine of mixed-species flocks.  Blue-backed Conebills, Capped Conebills, Masked Flowerpiercers, Black-capped Hemispingus, Black-eared Hemispingus, Blue and Black Tanagers, Pearled Treerunners and other woodland species flitted from branch to branch.  Finally, I spotted one of my most-wanted birds—a Plushcap ducking into the bamboo.  This elegant tanager—with a deep maroon-brown body and a bright yellow forehead—is a classic skulker, so it was doubly nice to see it.

The pipeline trail at Guango Lodge

We saw several small groups of Andean Guans high in the epiphyte-festooned trees.  Guans are related to grouse and turkeys, but are highly arboreal and aren’t often seen on the ground.  The highlight of the day came when we neared the end of the waterfalls trail.  A loud nasal cry was coming from the undergrowth.  Knowing it was something I’d heard on the bird call recordings I’d brought with me (but with over 300 species on those recordings, I wasn’t surprised that I couldn’t recall what it was), I began to imitate the slurred whistle.  The leaves quivered as the bird ran unseen towards us.  Suddenly it popped out at our feet—an Ocellated Tapaculo!  This is a mind-blowing bird, its dark body spangled with silver.  And another new one for the Guango list.  I fumbled with my camera but the bird quickly retreated into the shrubbery, still calling loudly.  Returning to the lodge, I took a side trail through dense bamboo and stopped to investigate a strange call.  Amazingly, another tapaculo, this time the small Blackish Tapaculo, appeared in front of me.  Two tapaculos in one day, after I’d only seen one member of this hard-to-see family before in my life.

Cyrtochilum macranthum

After two nights at Guango we packed up the car again and drove down the winding highway, turning right at the junction town of Baeza, then found the turnoff for Cabañas San Isidro.  I’d stayed near hear in 2005 when I stopped overnight with my students at Yanayacu Biological Station and vowed I’d come back some day for a real visit.  We checked into our very spacious and comfortable cabin, then settled in to the lounge deck for a while to look at the view over the Andean foothills.  Flocks of Inca Jays and Subtropical Caciques worked through the trees.  One of the things I was looking forward to here was to see the famous “San Isidro Owl”, a bird that seemed to show intermediate characteristics between the Black-banded Owl of the Amazonia lowlands and the Black-and-white Owl found on the Pacific side of the country.  The first night we heard a wheezy bark near the lights that was probably the owl, while a Rufous-banded Owl gave its full wu-wu-wu-wu–WHU call from a tree near the dining hall.

The following morning we set out on the Cock-of-the Rock Trail, planning to walk to the Rio Cosango and return.  The forest here is simply magical—big trees draped in orchids, philodendrons and bromeliads.  A  Wattled Guan gave its bizarre call from the treetops, while Golden-headed and Crested quetzals called in the distance.  We descended to the river, then decided to continue along the trail, even though the map indicated it wasn’t in good repair in that section.  A pair of Powerful Woodpeckers paced along with us, flying from tree to tree.  We climbed up again to a view over a tropical waterfall, then up and down over various quebradas until we looped right back to the cabins.  A wonderful (tiring) morning walk.  That evening we had great looks at the San Isidro owl as we walked to the dining hall.  There we met Carmen Bustamente, one of the owners (her family also owns Guango Lodge) while enjoying an excellent dinner (the tomate de arbol mousse was to die for).

Masked Trogon

The next morning we walked up the road for several kilometres, taking a side trip up a trail that went through a favourite feeding ground of quetzals.  Several brilliant males of each species cackled and flew from tree to tree as we watched.  We returned again for lunch, then relaxed in the afternoon on the deck, where the canopy flocks moved across at eye level and the beer was very cold.  It rained hard all night and through the morning.  I did some umbrella birding (no umbrellabirds, unfortunately) before we packed up the car and drove back to Quito. The rain stopped before Papallacta Pass, so we stopped briefly to sample the totally different fauna–Andean Tit-Spinetail, Many-striped Canastero, Paramo Pipit.  Then back into civilization, downtown hotel, taxi to the airport at dawn.  It seemed hard to believe we’d only been away for two weeks; we were ready to go home but certainly planning to return.

I first birded the west slope of the Ecuadorian Andes in 1990 on a one-day adventure out of Quito into the subtropical wildness of the Nono-Mindo road.  The dirt road wound down from northern slopes Volcan Pichincha, past the cleared pastures of Nono and into the virgin forests of the Alambi Valley.  From the cool temperate forests we descended into the warm subtropical lushness, past the village of Nanegalito and finally ending up at the village of Mindo and the new Mindo Cloudforest Reserve.  Travel on the road was so slow-going, and the birding so good, that by the time we reached Mindo it was time to turn around and climb back to Quito.  I vowed to return one day for a longer stay and this was my chance.

Twenty years later, many things have changed on the west slope of the Andes.  A new highway provides quick access down to the Pacific lowlands, a smooth asphalt surface from Mitad del Mundo to Nanegalito and beyond.  But the road from Nono to the Tandayapa valley just before Nanegalito has been retained as a narrow, gravel-surfaced ecotour route dubbed Paseo del Quinde—perfect for birding.  We took the new highway almost to Nanegalito and turned up the Tandayapa road.  We checked into our home for the next 6 days—Alambi Cloudforest Lodge—a home-style lodge right on the Rio Alambi.

Jairo Sánchez, manager of Alambi Cloud Forest Lodge

Alambi Lodge is managed by Jairo Sánchez, a wonderful host and expert bird guide, fluent in English and knowledgeable about the bird fauna anywhere in Ecuador.  Alambi is a small lodge, and we were the only guests staying there at the time, so the experience was more or less like moving in with an Ecuadorean family for a week.  Most meals were prepared by Jairo’s mother Maria.

And did I mention the hummingbirds?  Ecuador is famous for its hummingbirds, but I’ve never visited a lodge with a greater volume or diversity of hummingbirds at its feeders than Alambi.  At almost any time of day, a scan of the dozen feeders would net 40 or 50 birds of a dozen species, and the total yard list is about 30 species.  The dominant species here is the Rufous-tailed Hummingbird, glittering green all over with a bright reddish-brown tail.  It’s the common hummer from the eastern lowlands of Central America down the western foothills of the northern Andes.  Its close relative, the Andean Emerald, was also common at the feeders.  Sparkling Violetears battled with their smaller cousins, the Green Violetears, while Brown Violetears hawked midges from perches above the feeders.  Green-crowned Brilliants sparred with Fawn-breasted Brilliants.  Spectacular White-necked Jacobins were always present, as well as the tiny (by Ecuadorian standards) Purple-throated Woodstars and always-eye-popping Booted Rackettails.  A little patience and concentration was needed to spot the small Western Emerald that darted in occasionally to feed while the bigger species bickered among themselves.  An elegant White-whiskered Hermit would regularly visit the shaded feeders nearest the tall shrubs, but the Tawny-bellied Hermits fed only from the huge heliconia flowers in the garden.  As you can imagine, it was easy to sit at the patio tables and watch the show for hours on end.

Rufous-tailed Hummingbird

And there were other birds of course.  A trail along the river provided close views of White-capped Dipper and Torrent Tyrannulets.  A pair of noisy Pale-legged (Pacific) Horneros were nesting in the aguacatillo tree in the garden and Jairo put out bananas on a bench every day for the tanagers and saltators.  As tempting as it was, however, we had no intention of lazing about Alambi all day for the next six days.  The lodge is nicely located to act as a base for exploring the many great birding sites of the west slope—Mindo, Bellavista, Paz de Aves, Milpe, Rio Silanche and more.

Our first excursion was up the Tandayapa Valley to Bellavista Lodge, a site I’d heard a great deal about over the years but had never visited (it didn’t exist 20 years ago when I last visited, but then, the area was only being discovered as a birding destination then).  After breakfast we pointed our little car up the hill and drove 12 kilometres straight up to Bellavista.  The change in elevation—2200 metres at Bellavista versus 1500 metres at Alambi—is enough to guarantee an almost completely new list of birds.  Like many ecolodges in Ecuador, Bellavista offers a good trail network that is accessible to the public for a nominal $5 charge.  That charge includes a good cup of coffee and an opportunity to take in their hummingbird feeders.  And what a different array of hummers—the dominant species here is the Buff-tailed Coronet, with regular cameo appearances from handsome Collared Incas, Gorgeted Sunangels, Speckled Hummingbirds, and that most spectacular of west-slope hummingbirds, the Violet-tailed Sylph.

Hummingbirds at Bellavista:  Buff-tailed Coronets (left and back); Violet-tailed Sylph, Collared Inca

We decided to walk the road along the ridge top that goes past the Bellavista Research Station and were not disappointed.  A group of Toucan Barbets honked through the trees, giving us great looks at their colourful plumage.  Then a pair of Plate-billed Mountain-Toucans worked through some fruiting trees. I spent some time working out the songs of tapaculos, a notoriously skulking family of birds that are difficult to see (and most of them difficult to separate based on appearances).  Most of those I heard gave the long rising trills characteristic of Spillmann’s Tapaculo, but one that sang from a bamboo thicket sounded like a Nariño Tapaculo.  One day I vow to actually see one of these little wren-like birds!  We came down one of the forest trails and found a roosting Common Potoo thanks to an obliging Bellavista guide.  A bonus was a calling Crested Quetzal that gave us stunning views of its glistening blue-green and red plumage—this species is rarer than the common Golden-headed Quetzal in this part of the Andes.  In the afternoon we went to Tandayapa Bird Lodge below Bellavista, but for some reason they charge $15 per person for trail access, and since there was only a couple of hours left in the day we thought we’d save the $30 and just walk the road—and had some great birding there.

The next morning we decided to take in one of the legendary bird shows of the west slope—Angel Paz and his antpittas.  Angel is a farmer and former logger from the Nanegalito area.  He built a trail on his forested property to allow birders to see an Andean Cock-of-the-Rock lek, and while doing so he literally befriended a female Giant Antpitta he named Maria.  His epiphany (according to legend) came when he saw Maria eating worms dug up while he was building the trail.  His property has become a must-visit place when staying in the Mindo-Tandayapa area, and the visit is always entertaining.  You meet Angel at 5:30 a.m., the sky still dark, potoos and pygmy-owls calling from the forest.  Just as it is light enough to walk without a headlamp, you follow him through the mora plantations and into the forest.  After about a half-kilometre walk, you begin to hear the squawks and squeals of displaying cocks-of-the-rock and you settle into the lek viewing blind.  A half-dozen scarlet males call in the narrow valley below, attended by a few maroon females.  Angel suddenly starts calling softly “Manuela, Manuela”, and a Giant Antpitta hops out of the forest on to the trail. A few tossed worms later, Manuela is peering at us only three metres away.  A short walk up the trail, Angel points out another anpitta on the trail—this is Maria, his first love, and she is soon enjoying a hefty pile of worms for breakfast.  A hundred metres beyond, Angel’s brother Rodriguo has called out Jose, a Moustached Antpitta, then a pair of Dark-backed Wood-Quail come out to dine on small banana chunks.  And so it goes at Paz de Aves.

Manuela the Giant Antpitta

After Angel failed to call up his usually most cooperative pal, Willy the Yellow-breasted Antpitta (the wait for Willito along the clear mountain stream was a nice break, though we were all getting hungry watching all the birds getting fed while our stomachs growled) we climbed up the hill to the elaborate feeding station for toucanets and other fruit-eaters.  Here Angel placed bunches of grapes and bananas on pulley wires and hauled them up into the mid-canopy.  We waited on narrow benches while Angel made tooting whistles to call in the barbets and toucanets.  A single Crimson-collared Toucanet flew in and tossed back a couple of grapes, then three Sickle-winged Guans cautiously approached and did the same.  The Toucan Barbets called in the distance, but didn’t come for breakfast, and there was no sign of the expected mountain-tanagers at all.  The last feeding station on the property was the hummingbird feeders at the edge of the forest, where we enjoyed views of Empress Brilliants, Violet-tailed Sylphs, Brown Incas and other hummers before finally getting breakfast ourselves.  It was worth the wait—Angel and his helpers had produced tasty bolones de verde (ground green plantain worked into balls, filled with cheese and deep fried… mmmmm) and huge empanadas.

The following day we drove to Mindo and began looking for Reserva las Tangaras, a private biological reserve where friends of ours were volunteering as caretakers. We finally found someone who gave us vague directions to the reserve, and drove several kilometres south of Mindo.  After a few false starts, we found a sign on the roadside and a small trail leading through an overgrown pasture.  It seems there was no actual road to the reserve at all, and small signs along the trail indicated the reserve was about a kilometre away, all downhill.  But the scenery and birding were both great so we continued on, finally crossing the Rio Nambillo on a cable bridge.  Unfortunately we found the station deserted—our friends were probably back in Mindo buying groceries.  We made the return hike (all uphill in the suddenly hot midday sun) and drove slowly through Mindo and there they were—Amanda and Scott carrying their purchases.  We made quick arrangements to come back the next morning for a proper visit.  The second trip was much more successful, including the discovery of a Club-winged Manakin lek.  Amanda and Scott had told us about the strange “tree-squeaking birds” they had only heard but never seen.  When I heard the sounds I realized this was a small group of male Club-winged Manakins.  Manakins as a family are well known for the strange and diverse dances and displays the males make to attract females.  Club-winged Manakin males do this by making insect-like tones by vibrating wing-feathers together at an amazing 100 times per second.  Each wing has two specialized feathers—one with a series of seven ridges on it, and a neighbouring feather with a curved tip.  The feathers produce a sound each time the tip rubs against each ridge; since this is done coming and going, there are 14 sounds produced with each shake or 1400 sounds per second.  You can see and hear this display by clicking here.  The rest of the morning was full of great birds—a Sunbittern in the river, four species of toucans (Ivory-billed Aracari, Crimson-rumped Toucanet, Chocó Toucan and Chestnut-mandibled Toucan) and many other species.

Broad-billed Motmot

The next day we went back to Bellavista for the morning.  We met up with Carlos Sanchez, a volunteer guide from Miami, who showed us a roosting Common Potoo—so incredibly cryptic in its pose atop a snag that we wouldn’t have found it on our own.  Continuing up the trail, we encountered a couple of great mixed species flocks of birds, then found ourselves on the ridge road we’d walked a few days ago.  And there were Amanda and Scott, bicycling up the road towards us!  They’d hiked out of las Tangaras in the pre-dawn darkness, caught the bus to Nanegalito, then cycled 10 km straight up the mountain in hopes of meeting us—they had a set of portable speakers I’d accidentally left behind in their house!  We spent the rest of the morning with them, including a visit to Tony and Barb Nunnery’s place, touted as having the highest hummingbird yard list in the world (39 or 40 species at last count).  We didn’t see all of the hummers of course, but thoroughly enjoyed the show—as well as seeing a few new tanagers.

We were running short of cash by this point (Ecuador uses the American dollar as currency, by the way), so in the afternoon we drove to, appropriately, San Miguel de los Bancos, a largish town in the foothills west of Nanegalito and Mindo.  After a quick visit to the banco in los Bancos, Marg found an internet outlet to finish some work, and I drove back out of town to visit the Milpe Bird Sanctuary, a reserve famous for its lowland bird species typical of the Chocó, the bioregion on the west side of the Andes in Colombia and northern Ecuador.  I found myself alone at the reserve, but the hummingbird feeders were buzzing with birds—completely different from those at Alambi or elsewhere of course; the dominant species here was the Green Thorntail.  I walked the manakin trail to a Club-winged Manakin lek, and there found a great flock of birds, including four Ornate Flycatchers, an Immaculate Antbird and a stunning male Golden-winged Manakin.

Ecuador has long been one of my favourite destinations, with its friendly people, spectacular scenery and simply mind-boggling natural diversity.  Since I’m used to birding in Canada, a huge country with about 600 bird species within its borders; it’s difficult for me to comprehend tiny Ecuador being home to over 1600 bird species.  And well over 100 of them are hummingbirds!  I’d travelled to Ecuador three times before, leading natural history tours and teaching a field ecology course, but I’d never been there just on holiday.  So when my wife Marg and I began thinking of places to get away this fall, Ecuador rose to the top of the list fairly quickly.

Cotopaxi is the highest active volcano on earth (5,897 m / 19,347 ft)

We decided to keep it simple—two weeks away and staying at only three places for the most part, so that we could get to know the regions better.  We had to stay in Quito, of course, coming and going, but it’s a nice city as cities go.  And we added a night near Cotopaxi, just because I like Cotopaxi and wanted to go there with Marg.  So the plans solidified—a couple of nights in the high Andes, six nights in the west-side subtropics  and five nights on the east side of the Andes.

Limpiopungo, a rich alpine lake at the foot of Cotopaxi

Our day in Quito was perhaps typical of the first days of many trips after 30 hours of flying and airports.  We strolled through Parque El Ejido a little groggily, perhaps a bit tipsy from the altitude (Quito is over 9000 feet elevation), but happy to see the Eared Doves, Great Thrushes (think of a very big, all-grey, American Robin) and Black-tailed Trainbearers.  The latter are a fine introduction to the amazing hummingbird diversity of Ecuador—tiny green bundles of energy trailing a ridiculously long tail.

Andean Lapwing

The following morning we were more energized, and after picking up our rental car we headed south to visit Cotopaxi, the highest active volcano in the world. The high Andes of Ecuador are dominated by two parallel ranges of stunning, snow-capped volcanoes:  Cayembe, Pichincha, Rumiñahui, Illiniza, Antisana, Tungurahua and more.  But the two peaks that have long been tucked away in the romantic travel centre of my brain are Cotopaxi and Chimborazo, mainly because of an old poem that was in our family repertoire when I was a boy.  Something about “Chimborazo, Cotopaxi, took me by the hand…”. Chimborazo has another highest-peak honour—because it is the highest mountain near the equator, and because the earth has a slight bulge centred on the equator, Chimborazo can rightfully claim to be the highest point on the planet, or at least the farthest point from the centre of the earth.

Andean Gull

But I digress, we were going to Cotopaxi.  And running into trouble because of the confusing way Ecuadorian highways seem to lack important signs at critical points.  Such as the junction of two of the country’s major highways, where the entrance to the Pan-American highway slips by looking like a laneway to nowhere.  So we ended up taking the scenic route to Cotopaxi, but it was a sunny day and the snow-covered cone beckoned us as we poked along behind slow trucks through the farmland of the central valley.  A short while after rejoining the Pan-American Highway, we turned off to the east and entered Cotopaxi National Park.  The lower slopes of the volcano are forested in exotic pines, most of them Monterey pines.  There are no native pines south of Nicaragua in the Americas, but Monterey pines have been used to reforest huge areas of the mountains of tropical America, and indeed the tropics and subtropics around the world.  It is unfortunate that the tremendous diversity of these warmer climes has been substantially reduced by deforestation and subsequent replanting with a monoculture of foreign trees.  Their partners in crime in this situation are eucalyptus trees, which are also common throughout the highlands of Ecuador (and central America, and Africa, …).

Chuquiraga jussieui

 Clouds were beginning to slide across the blue sky, but we managed a few pictures of Cotopaxi’s summit before it was obscured.  I was happy at that, since after three visits this was the first time I’d seen its peak at close quarters.  We paid our park fee at the entrance and began to climb out of the pines into the true paramo, the treeless ecosystem of the high Andes.  Large clumps of grass were interspersed with shrubs, some with clusters of white daisy-like flowers, others with spike of bright orange blooms.  The latter were the chuquiraga, the favourite nectar source for the Ecuadorian Hillstar.  I really wanted to see a hillstar, not only because they are a beautiful bird, but because they are a quintessentially tropical bird living in a harsh, cool, and sometimes even snowy environment.  Canadian hummingbirds miss out on snow by migrating south to Mexico for the winter, but hillstars actually go into torpor (basically short-term hibernation) for days or even weeks when cold weather hits the Andes.

We parked the little car at Limpiopungo, a small marshy lake at the base of Cotopaxi at about 12,500’ elevation.  The colony of Andean Gulls were in the middle of the breeding season there, with many birds still on nests and some downy young swimming quickly into the cover of the reeds.  Andean Coots dove for food, while Andean Teal dabbled on the surface.  As we began to hike around the lake, a pair of agitated Andean Lapwings (are you sensing a pattern in the English names of these birds?) tried to draw us away, presumably from their young.  There were also a few familiar faces in the birds there—small flocks of Baird’s Sandpipers foraged at the water’s edge as well as on the barren paramo—these birds breed in the high Arctic tundra of Canada, then make the long flight south to winter in South America.  On the far side of the lake the trail crosses a creek, where we found a small flock of Plumbeous Sierra-Finches and a pair of Stout-billed Cinclodes.  When bird biologists first began giving English names to the thousands of birds native only to South America, they quickly ran out of ideas, and many forms unfamiliar to European eyes are simply called by their scientific genus names—like the cinclodes.  Cinclodes, by the way, means dipper-like, which I suppose these birds are to some extent—short-tailed, short-winged—but there the resemblance ends.

Stout-billed Cinclodes

I suddenly saw a small flash of white in the shrubs, and there was an Ecuadorian Hillstar at last!  And feeding on chuquiraga flowers no less.  Sedge Wrens and Virginia Rails called from the back end of the marsh.  Like a lot of species with disjunct distributions in North and South America, these southern forms are often split off as separate species—for example these two species are sometimes called the Grass Wren and the Ecuadorian Rail respectively.  It began to rain, then hail, so we hurried back to the car, and pointed it down hill.

Next chapter–the western slope of the Andes.

The season has certainly changed in the last week, with summer disappearing into a series of cool nights and rain showers.  The peaches are all in jars and harvest thoughts are shifting to apples, which get redder by the day.  The daily bird list for the back yard changes constantly now as flocks of sparrows, warblers and occasional flycatchers flit through the bushes.  With mid-day temperatures down to only 20°C (68°F) I don’t have any excuses to stay off the bike for longer rides, so I decided to cycle down to the Vaseux Lake Bird Observatory on Saturday morning to help out with the daily census.

Rock Wren (not the one singing in the dark!)

The census has to start an hour after sunrise, and I figured it would take me about two hours to cycle down to Vaseux.  So I got up at 0445 and was off into the dark at 0512, breezing down the hill to Penticton and along the dyke of the river channel.  At Skaha Lake I decided to go down the east side, since the route is a little shorter and the paved road would be safer in the dark than the sandy, gravelly trail along the west side.  The dawn chorus is pretty feeble these days, even with the minor resurgence in song that the equinox brings.  A Rock Wren trilled from one of the outcrops along the road, then a Killdeer flushed off the lakeshore next to the road.  I realized something else was with the Killdeer, a small shorebird giving a dry kit call.  Sanderling!  A good bird here in the valley, and new for my non-motorized transport (NMT) year list.

The sky brightened as I neared Okanagan Falls, and I pulled into the banding station at 0650, a full twenty minutes ahead of my 2-hour estimate.  I’ll sleep in longer next time!  I chatted with banders Doug Brown and Barry Lancaster as I waited for the census start time.  They had seen two good birds already—a Long-eared Owl that flushed out of a woodlot at dawn, and a Sandhill Crane that appeared to land at the north end of the lake.  Both would be new for my NMT list, but were long shots now as their destinations were out of sight.

The census started off well, with a Northern Waterthrush chipping sharply from the marsh.  A Black-headed Grosbeak gave some uncharacteristic chattering notes and a Clark’s Nutcracker flew high overhead.  The resident Bald Eagle launched from its traditional perch on a big ponderosa pine and glided toward the local coot flock, looking for breakfast.  Hundreds of swallows swirled overhead, mostly Violet-greens with a few Barns mixed in.  The swallow chatter rose abruptly in volume as a Sharp-shinned Hawk sailed through the flock.

Okanagan River channel at the Vaseux Lake Bird Observatory

I finished the census at about 0840 (39 species total—about average), then cycled south for a kilometre to the north end of Vaseux Lake to see if I could see the Sandhill Crane from the observation blind.  A few Wood Ducks, Northern Pintail, Northern Shovelers, Mallards and Ring-necked Ducks were scattered over the lake, and the eagle still had over 200 coots to choose from by the looks of things, but no cranes in sight.  Across the highway a meadowlark sang, then the glorious cascading song of a Canyon Wren.  I turned north towards home at about 0930, hoping to get there before the forecasted north wind kicked up.  The clouds had cleared and the temperature was rising fast as well.

Skaha Lake (from a helicopter, not a bicycle!)

At Okanagan Falls I took the west side railbed trail along Skaha Lake, the trail busy with walkers and bikers on this holiday weekend.  I bumped into Debbie Clark, a friend who is working for Parks Canada in their attempt to establish a national park in the south Okanagan.  I was happy to hear that Debbie’s outlook on this project was increasingly optimistic, so hopefully we’ll hear some good news on official levels before the end of the year.  At Penticton I turned onto the river channel dyke again.  A stop at a mucky oxbow, a remnant of the old river course before it was channelized in the 1950s, produced a Pectoral Sandpiper, another new NMT bird!  The north wind kicked up strongly so I got a good workout cycling the length of the river before turning to climb the long hill to my home.  I got there a little dehydrated, despite drinking my two litres of water, but quite happy with how my legs felt.  It was good to be back in the saddle.