Weather @ 4:00 AM
20C and mainly cloudy
Wind W 31 km/h
Humidity 78%
4:33 open gate, start shift
4:38 drove into parking lot #5 and was greeted by my first raccoon of the season, quickly sent him on his way
4:44 noticed footprints inside the flagged off feeding area
4:48 parking lot 5 chicks found on beach hiding in willows of designated feeding area, all present and accounted for, as I approached they all scurried down the roadway and into the parking lot, we'll never catch these speeding bullets to band them
5:08 male channel plover greets me, quite agitated, after some time, I only find one chick and it nestles under dad
5:25 the male flies back to check me out still agitated, there is a brisk cool wind coming off the lake so I'm hesitant to keep him away much longer, I'll take one more walk to see if the whole family is huddled together somewhere, then I'll back off
5:44 a sigh of relief, it took me a while to finally observe the channel chicks, I walked in behind the dunes to the top of one and found the male huddled close to the snow-fence of the enclosure, he eventually 'released the hounds' and revealed the three chicks much to my relieve, all present and accounted for on day 10
6:07 forgot to mention yesterday, I found a yellow warbler nest with two eggs and two freshly hatched chicks, no cowbird egg(s), located in small willow behind dunes close to where the plovers nested the last couple of years
7:12 John, Dianne and their grand-daughter Jayne paid me a visit so they could show Jayne the chicks, and the chicks put on quite a show scurrying all about
7:36 greater yellowlegs wading along west shore of channel
8:38 a huge herring gull landed on shore and was wolfing down something, I was sure I knew where the three chicks were, but the male plover didn't like his company, but couldn't scare him off so I went over to investigate, sure enough a nice size pickerel had washed up on shore and the herring gull was trying to make short work of it before any others moved in
9:18 my colleague Shauna, checked in for an update
10:03 chicks resting, good time for a bathroom break
10:38 Matt dropped by for a visit, dad decides to lead the chicks down for a drink of water, one runs so fast it does a header in a footprint, hysterical
10:53 have a nice chat with a fellow from Vancouver, he's just on his way home after traveling across the breadth of the country all the way to St. John's, Newfoundland, he has a load of questions about the plovers and program, I give him the full spiel
11:12 an osprey makes his morning cruise along the lake in search of a fat fish for family
11:18 seven male Sanderlings, a small sandpiper-like shorebird in breeding plumage, make an unexpected appearance along the east shore of the channel in the flagged off area for the plovers, as they nest in the high Arctic the obvious question would be, are they still headed north?
11:30 Shauna drops by after watching the parking lot birds and takes over from me for the afternoon shift
12:05 dad and the chicks come close for a visit, dad takes a bath in a back pool of the channel, all are content
12:30 shift ends
...to be continued
KP
