Took advantage of an unexpected week off in late August to do a bit of B.C. exploring. Started off heading to good ole’ Tunkwa as we hadn’t been there since the Canada Day long weekend. Arrived at 8 in the evening…
Just in time to catch this sunset. With only about 20 of the 220 sites occupied we settled in on the spit which we had pretty much to ourselves.
August 27th was my definition of paradise ~ the temperature had dropped to close to freezing overnight with a heavy fog over the lake that had dissipated by 8:30 or so, with the sunshine.
The lake was like glass and so quiet….
We set off for a walk around the north end of the lake, over to Bluff Lake….
Lot’s of Lesser Scaup families over here – I’ve mentioned before how this species of ducks are really late nesters….
Raising young Lesser Scaup seems to be a community affair….
We counted over 70 ducklings….
This being late August we knew shorebird migration was well underway…this pair of Greater Yellowlegs were poking about on the shoreline.
Here is a late summer look at Bluff Lake….there wasn’t a bird on it.
The spillway from Tunkwa to Leighton was now totally dried up.
Heading back to the campground I spent the rest of the day just wandering and taking pictures….
The whole area was over run with Yellow Rump Warblers….there had to be hundreds of them…
The Canada Geese were very relaxed after a summer of activity…
In fact they made for some artistic pictures as they blended in with the late summer grasses..
I especially like this one…
Quite a few Starlings hanging about….not in the massive numbers you find around farms and ranches though…
Here is another one of those numerous Yellow Rump Warblers…no longer in his brilliant breeding plumage.
Someone else no longer in his brilliant plumage is this male Mallard….he’ll only change his brilliant emerald green head to this dull one for a couple of months before turning back into the colors everyone associates with Mallards.
In the quite area between the spit and the main part of the campground, there was a family of Pied bill Grebe. I’ve seen Pied bill Grebe here before, but never a family of them.
It was a treat to be able to watch them. One of the little guys came up with a frog almost as big as he was!
A walk along the shoreline in the afternoon found some more shorebirds.
The inevitable Killdeer of course….
but also a Semi-palmated Sandpiper (closer bird) and a Baird’s Sandpiper (further bird)
I even managed to get my kayak in the water, for the first and only time this year!
Snuck up on these sleepy ‘eclipse’ plumaged Mallard.
an after supper walk found us another shorebird species….this one a Solitary Sandpiper…
poking about along the edge of Leighton Lake…
and so an absolutely perfect day, drew to a close.
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