Nature Vancouver held a birding field trip at Iona Regional Park on Thursday October 21, 2022, led by Jan Lowcock, Harvey Dueck and Michele Baudais. A group of experienced and new birders scanned the outer ponds, wooded area, the adjacent section of the Fraser River and the mudflats at low tide. The inner settling pond areas are now closed to the public, but the south ponds were viewed from the elevated walkway. Eyes on the sky proved most rewarding…
Report by Doug Cooper It’s been a while since my last report on the nature happenings at the sanctuary at Hasting Park. I was away for much of the spring and summer this year, so part of my report is from information posted by other users of the sanctuary green space. An exciting find for me in early April was a Townsend’s Solitaire, I believe the first recorded sighting in the sanctuary. I had only my mobile phone with me and my…
Submitted by Peter Ward Cascade Bird Box Team is composed of members of both Delta Nats, and of Nature Vancouver. The team built 10 Tree Swallow boxes for New Brighton Park (funded by Nature Vancouver), plus a handful of boxes to add to the number at Fraserview Golf Course. We supplied and installed several Barn Owl boxes earlier this year. More Barn Owl boxes were built in September and have not yet been installed. Jim Kneesch developed a brilliant new…
Submitted by Penny N. Lim One spontaneous Saturday afternoon (11th June 2022), I set out to Burnaby Lake with Marie Joe, to see the awesome Mandarin Duck. Was the day ever hot and the detours cumbersome! Easy birding at Burnaby Lake. A few steps along the trail, we came upon visitors feeding birds and taking pictures. We stopped still where a crowd gathered. Feeding in the grass was a Sandhill crane family just off the trail. In the open. A perfect view of a fluffy chick. The chick…
Submitted by Colin Clasen For information about the definition, and the importance of buying Bird Friendly Coffee, please see the web pages of Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center from the following links: https://nationalzoo.si.edu/migratory-birds/about-bird-friendly-coffee https://global.si.edu/success-stories/smithsonian-migratory-bird-center-bird-friendly-coffee Also please see an article by Birds Canada about switching to Bird Friendly Coffee: https://www.birdscanada.org/making-the-switch-to-bird-friendly-coffee/ Bird Friendly Coffee Sellers in Metro Vancouver As of 2025, there’s a new bird-friendly coffee roaster in town: Big Year Coffee. The owner, Avery Meeker, studies bird population dynamics as a Ph.D…
By Peter Ward This time of the year is the best season for listening to birdsong. Pick a patch in your favourite forest, park, or an open grassland, or even better a water’s edge with cattails and you’ll be rewarded with the rich experience of multiple male birds singing to defend their territories. These apps help amateur bird watchers and ornithologists know what they are listening to. They are immensely helpful with identification of species and work even if multiple…
Submitted by Bryna Turk Cats and Birds is a project of the non-profit Stewardship Centre for BC that helps make British Columbia a safer place for cats, birds, other wildlife, and people. After habitat loss, outdoor roaming cats are the #1 source of human-related wild bird mortality, killing as many as 350 million wild birds every year in Canada alone. Of these, about one-sixth, or over 58 million bird deaths per year are by owned pet cats who are allowed…
Trip report by Christine Thuring From Thursday to Saturday (June 16-18), a small group of five backpackers enjoyed the trials and tribulations of early summer in Garibaldi Provincial Park. The wildflowers were quite behind schedule, there were 5 active bears in the area and the snow line was surprisingly low. Still, we had a fantastic time. Our home base was the Cheakamus Lake Campground (at 850m elevation), where we occupied two sites, separated by a thicket of dogwood and hawthorn….
Submitted by Peter Ward It started in 2008, when I made an extension to my home workshop. Somehow building bird boxes brought together a trait that I inherited from my maternal grandfather, and a passion for bird watching. With a couple of friends, John Toochin and Ken Hall, I started building boxes, using some ideas for size from an old publication by BC Provincial Museum, 1979. We targeted local birds known to nest in man-made boxes. It turned out that…
Trip Report by Jan Lowcock Fifteen Nature Vancouver birding enthusiasts joined Jan Lowcock for a walk in Vancouver’s Queen Elizabeth Park on Thursday April 28. The walk began in the rose garden and adjacent walkways under cloudy but dry conditions. We had a quiet start but were soon rewarded with good views of a Pacific-slope Flycatcher, which Harvey Dueck was able to capture in his scope. (Thanks Harvey, for carrying and setting it up for the group). The sun began…