Trip Report by Harvey Dueck

Sixteen people joined trip leaders, Harvey Dueck and Michelle Baudais for a morning of birding at Burnaby Lake. It’s interesting that the turnout was the same as for the walk on the previous day: we had expected a few more people would turn out on a Saturday morning. Perhaps the clouds and chance of rain kept a few people from coming. At least three of the participants were attending their first Nature Vancouver event. It was great to have them along.

Both days we had a few new birders who had not brought binoculars. The trip leaders and one participant brought spares to lend out, but it would be great if Nature Vancouver had a set of five to ten decent quality binoculars that trip leaders could loan to participants.

The weather was overcast, but pleasant. The pattern of bird activity was quite different from the previous day, perhaps due to the difference in the weather and also to the increased human activity in the park on a Saturday (vs Friday) morning. We saw fewer warblers, sparrows and towhee in the open areas, but the chickadees, kinglets and nuthatches seem to be more active in the coniferous forest away from the lake. Some of the birds that had been along the boardwalk on Friday were absent on Saturday, but there were still lots of birds.

We saw song sparrows, white-crowned and golden-crowned sparrows along the path to the boardwalk. There were American coots, mallards, wood ducks and green-winged-teal in the water. The long-billed dowitchers were a bit more active: most were snoozing, but a few were actively feeding along the mud flat. One Wilson’s snipe was in much the same spot we saw it Friday morning. A juvenile Cooper’s hawk perched on a tree as we were leaving the boardwalk.

Along the trails we saw black-capped and chestnut-backed chickadees, along with some song sparrows. We got to watch Steller’s jays feeding on acorns from an oak tree. The conifer loop brought us golden-crowned kinglets, a red-breasted nuthatch and a brown creeper.

We finished off with sighting a male downy woodpecker, who posed atop a bare tree for several minutes. A very pleasant morning, with enjoyable company.

Species List

chestnut-backed chickadee	Canada goose
black-capped-chickadee	Wilson’s snipe
song sparrow	long-billed dowitcher
white-crowned sparrow	American crow
golden-crowned sparrow	pied-billed grebe
red-winged blackbird	great blue heron
downy woodpecker	spotted towhee
orange-crowned warbler	Steller’s jay
wood duck	American robin
American coot	Anna’s hummingbird
mallard	Cooper’s hawk
green-winged teal	golden-crowned kinglet

Notable non-birds

banana slugs
pacific tree frog (heard only)