April 25, 2003 Common Loon migration over Elgin and Oxford Counties.
Between 7:30 a.m. and 9:20 a.m. we counted 110 Common Loons migrating northwest over our place in north central Elgin County. At Ingersoll, in Oxford County, Ross Snider counted 68 loons between 7:30 and 9:00 a.m. and his view of the horizon is much more restricted than ours. It's not often we have two good days of migration in a row. Most years the big counts are centred around April 20, so two days in a row of high counts suggests that the loons have been held up for some reason.
In response to my posting yesterday of 111 migrating loons , John Carley (Toronto) emailed to say that yesterday was his best day this year so far as well. Here's what he wrote about this year's loon migration.
"Since April 6th, I've counted only 122 loons. Last year, by this date, I'd tallied 413 loons! However, today (April 24) we counted 70 loons between 6:40 and 7:20 am. We look West and SW over the Humber River, south of Dundas (i.e. very close to Lake Ontario). When I spoke to George Fairfield at 8:30 am, he was at 30+ and counting still. George counts from his house, looking east. His house is about 14 km from mine, but essentially part of the Don River area."
Note that John Carley and George Fairfield are counting loons leaving Lake Ontario and heading north, probably towards Georgian Bay and Lake Simcoe. We are counting loons leaving Lake Erie and heading northwest to southern Lake Huron. It's interesting that the yesterday was the first big push of loons off both Lake Erie and Lake Ontario.
Dave Martin, Linda Wladarski & Ross Snider Harrietsville & Ingersoll [EMAIL PROTECTED] Dave Martin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Visit http://www.ofo.ca/ontbirdsguide.htm for information on leaving and joining the list. As well as general information and content guidelines.
