The Reluctant Twitcher by Richard Pope Page A

Orchard Oriole on the Point.
    May 9 (216). Five new birds: Philadelphia Vireo, Prairie Warbler, Canada Warbler, all on the Point; Marsh Wren at St. Clair Wildlife Area; Yellow-headed Blackbird at Angler Line.
    May 10 (224). Eight new birds, including Black Tern on the Marsh Boardwalk and Black-billed Cuckoo, Blue-winged Warbler, Tennessee Warbler, and Mourning Warbler on the Point.
    May 11 (226). Two new birds: Solitary Sandpiper and Bobolink on Pelee Island.
    May 12 (227). One new bird: Blackpoll Warbler on Pelee Island.
    May 13 (228). One new bird: Common Moorhen on Pelee Island.
    May 14 (230). Two new birds: Green Heron and Virginia Rail on Pelee Island.
    May 15 (231). One new bird: Yellow-billed Cuckoo on Pelee Island.
    May 16 (235). Four new birds: American Avocet and White-rumped Sandpiper at Hillman’s Marsh and Yellow-bellied Flycatcher and Prothonotary Warbler, both on the Tulip Tree Trail at Rondeau Provincial Park.
    I return home at 235 with fifty-three new species, including some good ones I might have had a hard time chasing down elsewhere, but I am fifteen short of where I wanted to be and am missing some must-get birds.
    Be it duly noted that I am glad, really glad, that my pal John Carley so effortlessly saw the Chuck-will’s-widow just after I went home. I am particularly pleased that he had such excellent and prolonged close-up views and derived such immense pleasure from this bird, which would have been a new one for my Ontario life list. Margaret got it, too, — further cause for gladness and joy. She also got Olive-sided and Acadian Flycatcher, Louisiana Waterthrush, Golden-winged and Orange-crowned Warbler, and Yellow-breasted Chat. Boy, am I glad she is not in any way even trying to keep ahead of me, let alone competing with me.
    All my hopes are now on Rainy River, especially since, for the first time in ages, Thickson’s Woods has failed to produce any rarities or southern overshoots this spring. Sadly, Margaret’s hip cannot take the long car trip to Rainy River. Nor can Jim Fairchild’s health permit, though I do ask him despite the fact that he did sneak up to Parry Sound and get the Blue Grosbeak after we had both decided it was probably too long a shot to merit trying. Hughie and I shall have to try not to pull too far ahead of them.
    Heh-heh.

8
The Numbers Build

    The Lord giveth …
    â€” A FTER J OB 1:21
    B ETWEEN MY RETURN FROM P ELEE on May 16 and my departure for Rainy River on June 15, I see twenty more species without killing myself (a fact I come to regret later), bringing my total to 255.
    Brant (May 23). Jim Fairchild phones and swears there is a Brant floating in the third pond at Nonquon Sewage Lagoons; I am not fussy and go there, alone. My wife says she is busy despite happy memories of our first date. There are people who hold that there is something humorous about sewage lagoons, something to snigger about. Let it be said here and now, I do not number among them. I love a good sewage pond.
    All is as Jim said. I feel sorry for the Brant. But it’s a tick. I also get my first Semipalmated Sandpiper of the year.
    Sedge Wren (May 19). Presqu’ile. Margaret hears a tiny chip in the bushes by the beach. I must have been distracted. I didn’t hear zip.
    â€œIsn’t that a Sedge Wren call note?” she asks modestly.
    â€œYeah, I think so,” I reply. I mean, what are you going to say: “I didn’t hear nothin’?” It is, of course, a Sedge Wren, though I believe it has a strangulated syrinx or a hernia and has to call abnormally quietly. I don’t feel so bad when Fred Helleiner practically steps on it later. He says, “I didn’t realize it was so close.”
    â€œWhat?” I say. “Didn’t you hear it chip?”
    Whimbrel (May 24). Colonel Sam Smith Park. After failing spectacularly all along the eastern lakefront, I see repeated flocks, plus Willow Flycatcher and, finally, Gray-cheeked