DAILY WHIMBREL WATCH HAS NOW STARTED AT SAM SMITH PARK

Tim McCarthy from the Toronto Ornithological Club is the guy with the binoculars scanning the sky.  The other person is Wayne Renaud.  Go out to Whimbrel Point, talk to the observers and learn about Whimbrels.

There are many posts on the bird in this blog - to read them, enter "whimbrels" in the search bar (top right homepage).

Here is Tim's first Ontbirds report from Monday.  (To follow Ontbirds, here's how to subscribe.)

From: Tim McCarthy on behalf of Ontbirds:

I suppose you'd wonder where today's participants in the inaugural Fred Bodsworth Memorial Whimbrel Watch had gotten to if I didn't send out this note.
Suffice to say if you didn't come out today you did not miss any Whimbrels. You would have , had you been as masochistic as we are and stayed at it most of the day seen 18 Common Loons, 261 White Winged Scoters and 8 Black Brant among the usual swallows terns etc. If you had gotten thoroughly cold and bored and came back with me to get a coffee from the "Timmies" that was closed on

First Year Male Summer Tanager

account of there being no kids at school you would have gotten a half-moulted Summer Tanager. (half green, half red.) That bird stuck around most of the day, passing East to West and back just North of the old heating plant, the one with the tall chimney. Look up in the trees, its probably still there.
But there aren't any Whimbrels yet. Now we don't freeze in the cold and later fry in the sun out there on the Bodsworth Bench for nothing. Well, sometimes.
When the Whimbrels come tomorrow they will be most amazing to see and hear. And if they land where we think they will, it may prove to be a landmark (pun intended) addition to their migration pattern and even to their well-being.
The Whimbrel Watch takes place from now until the end of May starting at around 6 am each morning at the Southernmost tip of Sam Smith Park, known as Whimbrel Point. Sam Smith Park is  at the foot of Kipling Avenue in New Toronto, easily accessible by car or bus from Kipling subway station. It can be a lot cooler out there than it is at home so read the weather and dress accordingly. Bring something to sit on, your bins and a 'scope if you can and slather on the sunscreen.
Tomorrow we're gonna get 'em. 
Tim McCarthy