Boreal Birds #1

Canada’s Boreal Forest is a 1.4 billion acre green swath stretching from The Yukon in the west, across all provinces to Newfoundland in the east. Within this bird nursery, billions of birds are raised during the short but insect-laden summer months.

Although I now live in southern Alberta, I was raised in the northern Boreal Forest. Recently, I have received photos of boreal birds from two individuals, and decided to share them with my readers.

This first set of pictures comes from Dan Lefebvre, and were taken near Peace River, AB, which is about 780 km north of Calgary. He was walking around his work site when a bird dive bombed him, pretending to be injured and making quite a racket. He figured he must be near its nest but couldn’t see it for the longest time.

When he finally saw the eggs, he realized he was almost stepping on the nest. He then placed this bright yellow caution tape around the edge of the killdeer nest, and is now my hero. Every ground-nesting bird should have caution tape surrounding their nest.

I think every one of us doing any spring birding should carry a roll of yellow caution tape along with our binoculars, cameras, field guides… You never know when you’ll need to protect a nest. Well done Dan!

More boreal birds and wildlife tomorrow.