Park Birds

On Monday afternoon I visited 2 parks within town . Firstly a stop-off at Gabriel Dumont Park, where a Townsend's Solitiare was feeding on Juniper Berries right near the entrance.
This is now the 10th Townsend's Solitaire I have seen since November in town, and up until then, as some of you may know, I'd never seen one before! So this species is becoming abit of a habit this Winter.
Other than the Solitaire , the place was pretty much deserted with only 2 Black-capped Chickadees , and some fly-overs by Bohemian Waxwings.

I then went to Holiday Park, which isn't too far away, just a hop,skip and a jump across the river. There I was rewarded with a flash of colour from the still-present female Cardinal in the yard of the Bowerman House.

Other birds seen at the park :

White-breasted Nuthatch - 2
Black-capped Chickadee - 8
Red-breasted Nuthatch - 2
Dark-eyed Junco - 1 ( this bird could be one of the 2 seen over
Christmas )
Red-shafted Northern Flicker - 1
Common Redpoll - 15
House Finch - 5
Downy Woodpecker - 4
Hairy Woodpecker - 2
White-winged Crossbill - 9
House Sparrow - 7
Common Raven - 1
Black-billed Magpie - 2
Bohemian Waxwing - 35

On the way home there were several Rock Doves perched atop buildings along Broadway Avenue and the last bird I saw before I got indoors was my first Merlin of 2008 atop a spruce tree on 7th St.

On Saturday, my wife and I went to Pike Lake where we saw the usual suspects, plus 4 Pine Grosbeaks, a few Redpolls , 2 Red Squirrels and then a Great Horned Owl on a powerpole on the way home along the highway.

Here are some new photos ( click to enlarge )

Red Squirrel at Pike Lake



Common Redpoll at Pike Lake



Great Horned Owl on the Pike Lake Highway



Townsend's Solitaire at Gabriel Dumont park