The walk at Terra Nova that was scheduled for Saturday February 8th was cancelled due to icy trail conditions, but a few of us looked ahead at the forecast and saw warmer temperatures predicted for mid-week and decided to reschedule to Wednesday for those who were available. Unfortunately it wasn’t warmer! Four brave birders joined Harvey Dueck and Michelle Baudais for a beautiful sunny morning of birding, but the paths remained icy and we had to move slowly to stay safe.

We began our day on the dyke at the northern edge of Terra Nova, where we were greeted by a family of Trumpeter Swans (a couple of juveniles alongside two adults), many American Wigeon, Northern Pintail, Mallards, and a Red-breasted Merganser on the water. From here we decided to try our luck on the interior trails, where we immediately found no fewer than four Fox Sparrows double-kicking under the first clump of trees. This was a foreshadowing of the birding to come, as the sparrows and Spotted Towhees were all hungry and very visible as they searched for food in any area not covered by snow.

As we walked alongside the frozen ponds, we saw and heard waves and waves of Snow Geese passing overhead, alongside the song of Red-winged Blackbirds and the twittering of a few Pine Siskins. The garden area had many Black-capped Chickadees and Spotted Towhees as well as a few Song Sparrows, and it was fun to find tracks of a Great Blue Heron in the snow beside one of the paths.

Unfortunately, when we returned to the dyke trail we discovered that it was very icy, so we decided to head back towards our starting point instead of venturing further south. As we did we spotted a couple of Bald Eagles perched on a log deep in the salt marsh, a Great Blue Heron ditto, and a pair of female Mallards standing on the ice of the ditch beside the trail, wondering where the water had gone.

At the parking lot we found one final bonus bird: a female Northern Harrier who had apparently overheard us talking about how we’d love to just one more raptor.

Overall, we spotted 27 species, despite the amount of time we had to spend staring at our feet while we walked to keep from slipping: https://ebird.org/checklist/S213006411