The Reluctant Twitcher by Richard Pope Read Free Book Online Page B

perhaps not an entirely honest description. The bird has not been spotted for several days and is nowhere to be seen when Hugh and I arrive. I somehow know it is there, back in the grass, and that it will be necessary to go off the trail to find it. So I look long and carefully in all directions, check for hidden surveillance cameras, and wait for the right moment before quickly walking in off the trail, quietly asking Peter Whelan’s ghost for forgiveness this one time. Even the legendary Jon Dunn is afraid of the Pelee SS, who can be inappropriately fierce, so it is a risk. But it pays off; I see the bird right in front of me after a short weak flight. You have to get a few of this kind of bird to get to three hundred.

    Photo by Stephen T. Pike.
    Henslow’s Sparrow. West Beach Hiking Trail, Point Pelee. A declining grassland bird, this is a very hard sparrow to find in Ontario.
    Yellow-headed Blackbird. Nobody has seen any of these birds but Hugh swears he knows just where they will be on Angler Line on the east side of Lake St. Clair, so we rush up and, sure enough, his favourite marsh has a dozen of them. This leads to an inordinate if brief surge of confidence and wild optimism, which sadly turns out to be totally unwarranted. Things soon go straight downhill.

    Photo by Jean Iron.
    Yellow-headed Blackbird (male). Old Cut, Long Point area. This smashing bird is sadly retreating from most of its haunts in Ontario.
    By the time we reach St. Clair Conservation Area, it is teeming rain, and I mean bucketing, but Hugh is riding the wave of optimism and says we are “sure” to get Virginia Rail, Sora, and Least Bittern. He has spent a good deal of time this morning setting up rail and bittern calls on his tapes, and we head off in the rain with Hugh carrying his enormous ghetto blaster, and his friend Diana carrying his large beer-company umbrella and everything else. Our “certainty” of success makes the walk in the driving rain less unpalatable. Hugh plunks down the ghetto blaster at a likely point and says, “Here we go. We’ll try for Least Bittern first.” The excitement mounts; my wife is very keen to see this bird. “They should come right in,” says Hugh.
    Suddenly the air is split with the loudest and most insane cackling imaginable. Somehow the tape has been set for Wild Turkey and the volume is at high. No bitterns respond. No rails come out for a look. In fact, we don’t see anything at all for most of our walk. At one point I call a flying Least Bittern, which appears only briefly and then drops out of sight. Everyone else misses it and Hugh becomes very quiet. Black despair sets in. I am glad Felicity and I are in another car. Diana does her best to make light of the incident, to little avail. Ironically I later have to strike Least Bittern from my list because, according to my own rules, I did not get a proper diagnostic look.
    Mourning Warbler. Seen on the path while buying a muffin and coffee behind the Visitor Centre. The guy beside me, for whom the bird is a lifer, would have missed it had I not wrested his bins from him and roughly tilted his head downwards. His gratitude knows limits.
    Green Heron (Felicity’s favourite bird) and Virginia Rail . Both in the pond at Fish Point on Pelee Island. Adam Pinch and I are on the viewing platform bewailing the lack of rails when a Virginia Rail strolls out from under the platform and feeds unconcernedly for fifteen minutes.
    American Avocet. Three seen at Hillman’s Marsh on a quick drop-in on the way back from Pelee Island to Rondeau Provincial Park.

    Photo by Andrew Don.
    Green Heron (juvenile). Rattray Marsh. The head fluff and streaked neck can still be seen on this young bird.
    Yellow-bellied Flycatcher and Prothonotary Warbler . Both on the Tulip Tree Trail at Rondeau. The Prothonotary is in his usual slough; the Yellow-bellied is sweet because I find it first by its odd, truncated wood-pewee-type call,