SIGNS of spring are all around.
Anna's Hummingbirds are nesting, snow drops are putting on a dazzling display, and there's a definite dawn chorus each morning of singing birds. Towhees are trilling, chickadees are "tea-timing" (or is it "cheeseburgers?") and robins greet the dawn with their wonderful "cheerily, cheerily, cheer-up" song.
Waterfowl on the North Shore's ponds are busy with their courtship rituals. Some, like mallards, and wood ducks, breed here, but others, like scoters and goldeneyes, will depart to places as far away as the Yukon and Alaska.
Harlequin ducks will head for fast-flowing mountain streams, perhaps in the Cascade Mountains to the east. Recently, at Maplewood Conservation Area, there have been regular sightings of longtailed ducks, a species usually seen in deeper waters of the Georgia Strait. This beautiful bird breeds in the high Arctic with the icebergs and eiders.
Owls have been carrying on in local woods all winter with the barred owl's "Who cooks for you, who cooks for you all?" and the great-horned owl's booming "whoo, whoo, whoo." The barred owl is by far our most commonly seen and heard owl on the North Shore. It occupies a wide variety of habitats from city parks to woods.
Birders now await the northward migration of shorebirds (waders) from their South American wintering grounds. North Shore habitats like Maplewood Conservation Area's tidal ("mud") flats support a few wintering species like the greater yellowlegs and dunlin.
Rocky shores are where you can expect to see oystercatchers, turnstones and sanderling. The big migration waves of waders includes species like western, semipalmated and least sandpipers.
Tidal flats are critical for the survival of shorebird species as they migrate to the far north to breed. Recent studies have shown that a nutritious biofilm, composed of microorganisms, on the surface of the mud in a nutritious mucous-like slime is a vital component of the diet of many waders.
Waterfowl are also supported by the tidal flats, including dabbling ducks like pintails, wigeons, mallards and teal. Listen to the sounds of ducks. They don't all quack. Some whistle, some squeak, and teal sound like crickets.
Another sound of spring is the drumming of woodpeckers, especially flickers, on mailboxes, metal flashings around chimneys, drain pipes, and anything that makes a good drumming post. But why are they doing this? It is courtship time and the birds need to stake their claims as well as attract a mate. If a flicker, for example, is excavating a hole in a house, put a nesting box over the hole.
Did you know that you can identify woodpeckers by their characteristic drumming? The red-breasted sapsucker, for example, makes a very distinctive drum roll, whereas the downy's is a rhythmic tapping.
Anna's hummingbird sightings on the North Shore have been quite common this past winter, and soon we can look forward to the return of the rufous hummingbird from its Mexican wintering grounds. The rufous seems to time its arrival here with the blooming of salmonberry, red-flowering currant, and mahonia (Oregon grape).
March is when nature begins to awake from its winter slumber. The days get longer, there are more birds singing, and early spring flowers add sparks of colour to the scene. You might even see a butterfly dancing by.
Some butterfly species, like the mourning cloak, can over-winter as adults, "waking up" on warm spring days. Enjoy the outdoors and keep safe.
Al Grass is a naturalist with Wild Bird Trust of British Columbia, which sponsors free walks at Maplewood Flats Conservation Area on the second Saturday of every month. The next walk is this Saturday, March 10. Learn more about the return of the spring birds of Maplewood Flats. Meet at 10 a.m. at Maplewood Flats, 2645 Dollarton Hwy. Walks go rain or shine www.wildbirdtrust.org.
