Long Point Bird Observatory

I spent the fall of 2005 banding birds in Southern Ontario, at North America's oldest bird observatory

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Northern (Yellow-shafted) Flicker	The Breakwater cabin	South Beach at Breakwater	Mike Boyd performing the standard "lake watch" at Breakwater
View from the Breakwater ridge	Canada Warbler	Breakwater cabin's kitchen/living room	From the shoreline, looking back toward the Breakwater cabin
A Sharp-shinned Hawk	Mullein and tumbleweed on a Breakwater dune	Yellow-billed Cuckoo	Sunrise at Old Cut on the opening day of duck hunting...
Extracting a thrush at Old Cut	Banding a Sharp-shinned Hawk.	Long Point Provincial Park	Yellow-breasted Chat
Eastern Towhee	Blue-headed Vireo	Black-throated Green Warbler	Nashville Warbler
In between net rounds	Looking past the mist net toward the north side of the Tip.	Toward the mainland; the North side of The Tip	Jerome takes a step back to a simpler time while trying to stall the Phragmites. He ended up breaking the blade!
The Tip cabin; view from the Block Building	White-throated Sparrow	The Tip from the air... sort of...	Tufted Titmouse... Rare enough to be exciting!
Jerome and Andrea on one crisp and clear October morning.	The "slanty shanty"... the only option on those days too windy and wet to band.	Jerome on "lake watch"	The south side of the tip, toward Eerie, Pennsylvania
The ubiquitous lighthouse. No one who has been at The Tip left without a picture of it!	The block building as seen from the path taken for net checks.	We banded 11 Long-eared Owls	Ross spotted an unfortunate nuthatch, fallen prey to a Northern Shrike.
This is the unlucky nuthatch that was to serve as a Northern Shrike's prey. It was actually a bird we had banded earlier in the day.	Not only are Northern Shrikes an uncommon species at LPBO, until recently White-breasted Nuthatches were almost unheard of, making this a very significant event.	A Blue Jay. A commonly seen bird in the area, but not often banding in the fall.	Ross shows off the wound given to him by this Merlin. Two Merlins were banded on consecutive days
The "Block Building" at The Tip, with the lighthouse in the background. The Block Building was where the banding lab was located.	On top of the block building, looking out toward the tip.	The voracious Black-capped Chickadee.	Northern Saw-whet Owl. During the last half of the season, these little owls are lured in by tapes and banded.
Whether or not this was the Northern Shrike that killed the nuthatch, we banded it the next day in the adjacent net.	Another view of the block building from the net lanes	A typical landscape shot of the Tip, looking north form the Tree Swallow Cabin.	Fox Sparrow at The Tip
Stu showing how close you can get to a Saw-whet Owl	Male Golden-crowned Kinglet	Late afternoon at The Tip	Erosion on the south side of the Point
The Heligoland Trap, essentially a giant funnel with a box on one end	The cabin, a former lighthouse keeper's residence	Sunrise over Lake Eerie	Banding outside on my last day at The Tip
Backus woods; one of the largest remaining Carolinian forests in Canada	Fall in Backus	Fall in Backus	The "J Trap" at Old Cut, looking over the dyke and Long Point Bay.
Nets 12 and 11 at Old Cut, closed for the afternoon	Jerome captures an unlikely souvenir: a picture of the Minnesota plate on the Grunstmobile	Tulip tree in Backus	Ross and Ted at the Wood's "timeshare"
A scene from the Muskoka area at the timeshare.	Fallen trees on net 3 await the executive decision.	Snow on the last day...	The symbolic end to a season...
		I stole a few pics from Jerome before he left...
The only Hooded Warbler raised quite a stir.	A typical action shot when an interesting bird has been banded.	Dark-eyed (Slate-coloured) Junco	Mike holding his prize Peregrine Falcon, one of the banding highlights of the season