After spending a couple hours taking photos of Santa and loads of children at work, I decided to stop by Humber Bay to get photos of the local water birds. It was beautiful weather – the sun was out and the temps were on the warmer side for early December.
Mallard taking a break
The ducks were out in force. I’m not sure if that was the weather or if they always congregate here. It is a secluded spot and great shelter if the weather does turn. I just never suspected there to be so many of them.
Bufflehead – male
There were so many types of ducks here. Its the most I’ve seen here at one time. There were Buffleheads, Gadwells, Hooded Mergansers and, of course, Mallards along with a few others.
Gadwell
The male mergansers were putting on quite the show. I’m not sure if they were trying to impress the ladies or just fighting between themselves. Whatever they were doing the ladies were unimpressed.
Merganser couple
By the end of the day I had way too many photos of the ducks and it was time to get these photographs into the computer to see what I had captured.
Its a week later and I’m back on my bike, riding along the Humber River looking for that little Wood Duck I saw last week. As I looked in the regular “duck” spots all I found were the usual suspects.
Emerald Head
The beautiful emerald head of the mallard swimming along the river, a female red winged blackbird scurrying along the riverbank and few more mallards hanging out on the shoreline in the hopes of a thrown treat. Not a huge variety of birds but enough to practice my bird skills.
Female Blackbird
I’ve never really noticed this before but the year old male ducks look a little patchy as they finally get their adult colouring.
Mallard
Although I didn’t find the Wood Duck it was still a fun morning watching the mallards and blackbirds go about their business. Neither were too worried about us land animals.
Nigel and I headed to Humber Bay park with a special treat for our little feathered friends. Bringing along bird seed will usually guarantee that you will see some sort of bird. Sometimes they are the kind you don’t necessarily want hanging around.
Canada Goose
This Canada goose was terribly demanding. It squawked at us if we didn’t immediately hand over some seed. There were also a pair of mallards that were shovelling the food down. Honestly, some birds!
In the nearby pond some Gadwells were feeding on some algae. One got close enough for me to get a good shot. So even though some songbirds came by it was mostly the ducks and geese that pushed and shoved their way to the seed.
Gadwell
From Humber Bay we decided to make our way to Rattray Marsh in Mississauga and see if we could find some different birds. Turns out we were unable to find any different birds within lens range but we did spot a pair of mallards.
Female Mallard
This female just stood and stared at us while her mate same quickly away. I guess she knew we weren’t much of a threat.
So for the third time in a row I headed to Colonel Sam Smith park for some more photo hunting. Now that the frigid temps are upon us and I’m sure it will only get worse it was time to check out some ice.
Homer
In the inner pond that feeds out into the lake trapped bubbles have appeared in the newly frozen over area. The shape of these remind me of a melding of Homer Simpson and Pacman. After the exploration of the pond I went over to the lakeside to see what I could find.
Ice Whales
Lots of ice had formed on the shore with some of the rocks harbouring large pieces of ice further from the shore in the shallows. The two above reminded me to a mama whale and baby whale swimming along. They weren’t the only things “swimming” on the shore. A large group of mallards was headed in my direction with a couple females in the lead.
Female Mallard
They didn’t notice me right away but when the did they started to veer off. The female gave me a few looks before deciding it was safe to come a little closer. They eventually continued on their way looking for little things to nibble on as they paddled their way around the shore.
