Prince Edward Island Report

I want to apologize for the delay in getting my trip report out. Upon returning home from PEI, my wife and I had to prepare for inventory at our workplaces. We worked all week, last weekend, days and evenings, and finished inventory late Saturday evening. Thank you for your patience.

October on Prince Edward Island, Canada is a beautiful time of year to visit. The fall colors are peaking, potatoes are being harvested, tourists are virtually non-existent and the bird watching is spectacular.

My wife and I encountered four cloudy days out of the seven that we stayed on the island. Rainfall held off until our final night, and it was quite a storm. Temperatures during the day ranged from the upper 40’s to the low 50’s, two mornings brought frost and the wind blew quite hard four of the seven days.

Potato harvest was in full swing. There were multitudes of trucks passing everywhere we went loaded with the famous PEI spuds, with the smell of fresh earth and potatoes as the trucks passed by. We ate these potatoes prepared just about every way possible, and I must say that they are some of the best I have ever had!

The sands, dirt and mud on the island is red. Our car looked like it had been traveling on Mars after we finished our vacation. You will notice, in a few photos below, the red soil. We watched several birds drink from red mud puddles along dirt roads that we traveled. It was a nightmare to try to get correct exposure while photographing birds against the bright red backdrop.

We picked up eight life birds while on PEI. They will be marked with an asterisk in the species list below. The list consists of 70 different species seen and identified. Over the seven day period we were on the island, we navigated the entire coast, except for the Wood Island area. Because of the cloudy days, I did not get as many keeper pictures of birds as I would have liked. But the one I am very proud of is the Bald Eagle in fight photo below, which was taken on a very cloudy day.

Here is the species list of birds we recorded while on Prince Edward Island, Canada.

Prince Edward Island Species List

10/06/07 through 10/13/07

•  Common Loon
• Horned Grebe
• Double-Crested Cormorant
• Great Cormorant
• Great Blue Heron
• Canada Goose
• Brant
• Gadwall*
• Eurasian Wigeon*
• American Wigeon
• American Black Duck
• Mallard
• Northern Pintail
• Ring-Necked Duck
• Green-Winged Teal
• Common Eider
• White-Winged Scoter
• Bufflehead
• Common Goldeneye
• Hooded Merganser
• Red-Breasted Merganser
• Bald Eagle
• Northern Harrier
• Broad-Winged Hawk
• Red-Tailed Hawk
• Merlin
• Ring-Necked Pheasant
• Sharp-Tailed Grouse*
• American Golden Plover*
• Semipalmated Plover
• Greater Yellowlegs
• Lesser Yellowlegs
• Spotted Sandpiper
• Hudsonian Godwit*
• Red Knot*
• Sanderling
• Stilt Sandpiper
• Mourning Dove
• Belted Kingfisher
• Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker
• Downy Woodpecker
• Hairy Woodpecker
• Black-Backed Woodpecker*
• Northern Flicker
• Blue Jay (Province Bird)
• American Crow
• Common Raven
• Black-Capped Chickadee
• Boreal Chickadee*
• Red-Breatsed Nuthatch
• White-Breasted Nuthatch
• Ruby-Crowned Kinglet
• American Robin
• Gray Catbird
• Northern Mockingbird
• Brown Thrasher
• European Starling
• Yellow-Rumped Warbler
• Common Yellowthroat
• American Tree Sparrow
• Fox Sparrow
• White-Throated Sparrow
• White-Crowned Sparrow
• Dark-Eyed Junco
• Northern Cardinal
• Purple Finch
• House Finch
• Red Crossbill
• American Goldfinch
• House Sparrow

Near Brackley Beach, a marsh held 27 Great Blue Heron, which is a record amount for us to see at one time. They were feeding in the marsh and preening in the evergreen trees. Another record sighting for us was over 150 Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs in the same marsh noted above. One evening, a Northern Harrier spooked nearly a hundred Yellowlegs into the sky, and it is a sight that I will never forget! Near the town of Hunter River, at least 100 Canada Geese flew across the town and landed on the river. Regretfully, low light from the cloudy skies kept me from getting good pictures of the action.

Below are some of the many pictures I took while on PEI. Simply click a thumbnail for a larger view. Comments and criticisms are welcomed.

Over the next day or two, I will post a few of the many landscape pictures taken while on vacation.

 Happy birding!

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