Another Backyard Bird Count in the books

Well, so much for counting birds.  Sunday, the 3rd day of the count we gave up completely.  Beautiful sunshine but so windy and cold there was just nothing around.

Yesterday, the last day of the count we did get over to Harrison Bay....

it was actually quite beautiful as the wind was pretty much non existent.  It was quiet bird wise though...

on the way there, a number of swans in the fields including this family of Tundra Swans (with two Trumpeters at the rear).

a pair of Common Merganser, including this female who was perched in the sunshine.  Some Mallard, Northern Pintail and Green Wing Teal as well.

I'm thinking this is a female Northern Pintail....

and then there was this guy....now my guess is it is a hybrid between a Glaucous-wing Gull and a Herring Gull.  That is what I reported it as, if I'm wrong I'm sure someone will tell me.

Down the other way, where the river turns to head towards the Fraser river...

quite a few American Coots (some Mallard here too)

all the 'song' type birds were clustered down by the feeders...although there had been quite a few Black capped Chickadee further up the dike as well.

this day the geese were all over in one of the farm fields...a mixture of Canada Geese and Cackling Geese, well over 300 in total.

and one of the most consistent sightings despite the cold weather????

those Anna's Hummingbirds!  this one a young male.  I've also heard that some Rufous Hummingbirds have been seen in the Parksville area of Vancouver Island - that is about a month early, but then there have also been some Red flowering current in flower over there for the past few weeks - again about a month early....that was before the snow arrived - again!