These are the results of the 38th Woodhouse Christmas Bird Count held on
Sunday December 15th, 2024. The Woodhouse CBC is centred 7 km east of
Simcoe, at the crossroads of Highway 3 and Cockshutt Road at Renton, and
roughly covers from Port Dover to Waterford and just west of Simcoe to east
of Jarvis. 37 field birders covered the count area plus 11 feeder watchers.
Conditions were comfortable to start the day with temperatures above 0,
light southeast winds (11-16 km/h), zero snow on the ground, and plenty of
open water with little ice cover. Some light rain after lunch made for a
quiet afternoon, but didn't affect the count to a huge degree. The mild
temperatures leading up to the count meant waterfowl diversity and numbers
were high, but we could have used some snow cover to bring more sparrows to
the roadsides and feeders.
The day resulted in an incredible 10 record high counts. Hardy insect
eating birds are benefiting from our warming climate with wrens and
kinglets being found in higher numbers than usual this year. Between the
inaugural count in 1987 and 2004, Carolina Wren was never recorded in
double digits. Numbers began to rise modestly, and now the counts for the
last few years are 35, 16, 24, 26, and the new high this year of 46. This
is just one interesting example of the power of doing these yearly counts
and building a long-term data set alongside all the other Christmas Bird
Counts done across North America and beyond.
We tallied 88 species on the day, 1 more than the average of the last 10
years, and above the 38 year average of 83. No new species were added to
the all-time count list, and I'm not aware of any additional count week
species. A single White-winged Scoter is the first one since 1990, which
sounds long overdue for a count on Lake Erie.
Total Individuals: 22,105 (top 3 species were Canada Goose, Mallard, and
Greater Scaup)
Average over all 38 years = 24,688
Average for the last 10 years = 18,700
New Count Highs:
5 Wood Duck (3 several times)
49 Ruddy Duck (40 in 2023)
9 Merlin (6 in 2021) Even if a few wandering birds were double counted,
this species does seem to be increasing)
5 Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers (2 several times)
6 Pileated Woodpecker (5 in 2021)
46 Carolina Wren (25 in 2020)
16 Winter Wren (12 in 2019)
157 Golden-crowned Kinglet (79 in 2008)
3 Ruby-crowned Kinglet (ties high from 2006)
7 Hermit Thrush (4 in 2005)
Other Notable Finds:
1 Double-crested Cormorant (infrequent)
1 Snow Goose (1st since 2015)
1 American Wigeon (2nd time in last 10 years)
2 Canvasback (2nd time in last 10 years)
1 White-winged Scoter (1st since 1990)
1 Red-shouldered Hawk (1st since 2016)
1 Gray Catbird (2nd time in last 10 years)
Lowlights and Misses:
0 Northern Shrike (missed for 2nd time in last 10 years)
1 White-crowned Sparrow is unusually low
0 Red-winged Blackbird (missed for 2nd time in last 10 years)
Below is the full species list:
SPECIES
Total
Horned Grebe
11
Double-crested Cormorant
1
Great Blue Heron
10
Mute Swan
3
Trumpeter Swan
8
Tundra Swan
50
Canada Goose
7095
Cackling Goose
17
Snow Goose
1
Wood Duck
5
Mallard
1415
American Black Duck
141
Gadwall
32
American Wigeon
1
American Green-winged Teal
7
Canvasback
2
Redhead
1581
Ring-necked Duck
18
Greater Scaup
1714
Lesser Scaup
882
White-winged Scoter
1
Common Goldeneye
152
Bufflehead
199
Hooded Merganser
49
Common Merganser
283
Red-breasted Merganser
458
Ruddy Duck
49
Bald Eagle
12
Northern Harrier
10
Sharp-shinned Hawk
2
Cooper's Hawk
8
Red-shouldered Hawk
1
Red-tailed Hawk
67
Rough-legged Hawk
3
American Kestrel
13
Merlin
9
Wild Turkey
36
Bonaparte's Gull
153
Ring-billed Gull
541
Herring Gull
99
Great Black-backed Gull
4
Rock Pigeon
376
Mourning Dove
735
Eastern Screech-Owl
6
Great-horned Owl
1
Belted Kingfisher
6
Red-bellied Woodpecker
45
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
5
Downy Woodpecker
85
Hairy Woodpecker
23
Yellow-shafted Flicker
15
Pileated Woodpecker
6
Blue Jay
448
American Crow
529
Common Raven
8
Horned Lark
2
Black-capped Chickadee
502
Eastern Tufted Titmouse
4
Red-breasted Nuthatch
5
White-breasted Nuthatch
114
Brown Creeper
24
Carolina Wren
46
Winter Wren
16
Golden-crowned Kinglet
157
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
3
Eastern Bluebird
19
Hermit Thrush
7
American Robin
12
Gray Catbird
1
Northern Mockingbird
1
European Starling
681
Cedar Waxwing
6
American Tree Sparrow
446
Field Sparrow
2
Song Sparrow
32
Swamp Sparrow
36
White-throated Sparrow
62
White-crowned Sparrow
1
Slate-colored Junco
1649
Northern Cardinal
241
Rusty Blackbird
1
Common Grackle
2
Brown-headed Cowbird
47
Purple Finch
4
House Finch
86
Pine Siskin
2
American Goldfinch
185
House Sparrow
275