Trumpeter swan, Long-tailed Duck, Kestrel (20141227) A stroll on the "spit".

Inspite of the weather I wanted to head down to the Leslie Street Spit and the Tommy Thomson Park. Andy had introduced me to the park last year when we were here. Neil was game for a bit of a wlk so we headed out. Our first sighting was this American Kestrel that maintained a large "circle of confidence", as a result this was the best image I could manage.

Our next "find" were these 7 resting Trumpeter Swans. They were exhausted from all the "swimming" they had been doing during the 12 days of Christmas.

The park has been constructed with a number of "ponds", and with the mild weather the water was open everywhere. Here is a Common Goldeneye coming in for a landing.

Our next sighting was a terrific surprise. I had seen one Long-tailed duck last year on our trip, and today we found a couple of hundred of the birds. Here is about one quarter of the birds that were feeding near a foot bridge.

These were as noisy as a bunch of seagulls squaking. They would approach the foot bridge and then just start disappearing under the water.

Here is a portrait of one of these beautiful drakes.

Further along the trail we found a couple of American Tree Sparrows.

We next found J07 a Trumpeter Swan that had three other large white birds with it. We found these birds to be very cooperative, I just wish the light would have been better.

Here is one of J07's buddies. They were feeding very close to us, a terrific encounter.

 That is a good summary of our day. It was about 4 hours of walking and looking and searching, but we were both very happy with the outing. The Long-tails made it a very worthwhile exercise.  Get some wild in your life soon, it will do you a world of good.
Turbo