West Coast Sailing 5: The List

There were many great bird sightings on this trip with even the more “ordinary” birds showing amazing beauty…

Great Blue Heron, Ardea herodias

… and some remarkable behaviours, like a Belted Kingfisher, which was following a Harbour Seal around the bay at Musgrave Landing on Saltspring Island.  The seal was chasing a small shoal of fish around the shallow water along the shore and the kingfisher was dashing in to grab fish as they leapt out of the water ahead of the seal.  This is the best shot I managed to get of a kingfisher on the trip but it does capture a certain essence of what it’s like to see one of these birds hunting.

Belted Kingfisher, Ceryle alcyon

Anyway, that about wraps it up for the West Coast Sailing trip.  Here's a list of species seen, in chronological order with life birds in bold:

1. American Wigeon
2. Common Merganser
3. Glaucous-winged Gull
4. Bufflehead
5. Belted Kingfisher
6. Great Blue Heron
7. Common Goldeneye
8. Pelagic Cormorant
9. Double-crested Cormorant
10. Pigeon Guillemot
11. Canada Goose
12. Brandt's Cormorant
13. Hooded Merganser
14. American Robin
15. Dark-eyed Junco
16. Winter Wren
17. Herring Gull
18. Trumpeter Swan
19. Turkey Vulture
20. Barrow's Goldeneye
21. Anna's Hummingbird
22. Chestnut-backed Chickadee
23. Harlequin Duck
24. Northwestern Crow
25. Bald Eagle
26. Brant
27. Red-breasted Merganser
28. Rhinoceros Auklet
29. Common Murre
30. Song Sparrow?
31. Rock Pigeon
32. Mew Gull

Passing Cloud, Fine Madness, and Duen in Poet's Cove, South Pender Island