Long-tailed Duck: Ralph Hocken Photo.
The Tuesday bird walk went to the Plummer Road side of the Englishman Estuary in Parksville. The morning was cloudy but the wind was calm. The big highlight of the morning was the sighting of a Eurasian Teal (also known as a Common Teal) in with Green-winged Teal in the San Pariel mud flats off Mariner Way. The Eurasian Teal is a Northern European duck that winters in Britain, Holland and France. It is a regular visitor to Western Alaska and is a rare, but regular visitor along the Pacific Coast.
Other highlights included seen a Merlin being chased by one fiesty Rufous Hummingbird at the start of the walk. We saw a Snow Goose and a Greater White-fronted Goose in with the Canada Geese from the viewing platform. Offshore from Mariner Way there was a mixed flock of an estimated fifty-thousand seabirds including Brant Geese, Greater Scaup, Lesser Scaup, Surf Scoters, White-winged Scoters, Black Scoters, Long-tailed Ducks, Bufflehead, Common Goldeneye, Barrow's Goldeneye, Common Mergansers, Re-breasted Mergansers, Pacific Loon, Common Loon and Pelagic Cormorants.
Eight birders saw and heard the following fifty-seven species of birds:
Greater White-fronted Goose
Snow Goose
Canada Goose
Brant
Trumpeter Swan
Eurasian Wigeon
American Wigeon
Mallard
Northern Pintail
Eurasian Teal
Green-winged Teal
Greater Scaup
Lesser Scaup
Surf Scoter
White-winged Scoter
Black Scoter
Long-tailed Duck
Bufflehead
Common Goldeneye
Barrow's Goldeneye
Common Merganser
Red-breasted Merganser
Pacific Loon
Common Loon
Pelagic Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Bald Eagle
Merlin
Semipalmated Plover
Dunlin
Bonaparte's Gull
Mew Gull
California Gull
Thayer's Gull
Glaucous-winged Gull
Pigeon Guillemot
Rufous Hummingbird
Northern Flicker
Pileated Woodpecker
Northern Shrike
Northwestern Crow
Common Raven
Chestnut-backed Chickadee
Red-breasted Nuthatch
American Robin
Varied Thrush
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Spotted Towhee
Song Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Golden-crowned Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Red-winged Blackbird
Purple Finch
House Finch
Red Crossbill
Pine Siskin
Good birding
Neil Robins
Parksville
British Columbia
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