Signs of Spring at Rondeau

With another fantastic forecast ahead of us, signs of spring are starting to show themselves all around the park. Although still cool overnight and frosty in the mornings the warmth of daytime sunshine is bringing new life to to the park. A "spring green" water lily leaf rising out of a slough on the marsh trail is reaching for the sun.

This leopard frog lad (or lady) was also discovered during a walk along the marsh trail.

Raptor Show at "Wings of Spring"

This guy has the coolest job! Stephen Bucciarelli president of Predator Bird Services, with "Jo" a female barn owl.

A closer look....Barn owls are extremely endangered here in Ontario, only being found (in the wild) in a few places in the province. Beautiful, beautiful birds.

A young bird aficionado is born! Jo was very tame, having been raised from a chick by her "boss". She gracefully put up with quite a bit of petting from the crowd.

As Stephen presented each bird he gave a short talk about them and then let them show off a bit as he answered the many questions that everyone had about these predator birds.

Lots of photo-ops for both the pros and amateur wildlife photographers a the raptor show.

Pandora is a 3 year old bald eagle. Eagles get their full white head when they are about 5 years old so she has a rather "salt and pepper" appearance at this stage.

A Harris Hawk named "Martha Stewart" put on the best show for us. She would fly up onto a tree branch and land (not too gracefully unfortunately due to her ankle bracelets). Stephen would tempt her with a bit of food that he would toss up in the air, she would swoop down, grab it in mid-air, then fly back up to another branch to eat it. She seemed unconcerned with all the humans that she dive bombed on her way to grabbing the treats.

Pandora surveying her subjects.

If you build it they will come!

The Rondeau Bay Waterfowlers and the Friends supplied all the materials to make a free bird house at Wings of Spring. It was a very popular activity with young and old alike, the area in front of the Visitors Centre was a beehive of industry with many smiling faces seen clutching their new avian abodes.

The White family who are new to Chatham-Kent, having recently "migrated" here from northern Ontario, putting the last 2 nails in their bird house.

Little Ellie was all concentration pounding in that last nail.

Wings of Spring

This past weekend the Friends of Rondeau sponsored our "Wings of Spring" festival to celebrate the start of spring bird migration. The weather was spectacular (for March) and many people took advantage of the sunshine and relatively warm temps to come out to the park for a visit. The Friends had long distance scopes set up at various stations along Rondeau Bay for viewing the Tundra Swans, ducks and geese out on the water. We also had other fun and informative activities going on in and about the Visitor Centre including an artisan show and sale, bird house building workshops , a raptor show presented by Predator Bird services and a BBQ fundraiser. Many thanks to everyone who came out to the park to support the festival and kudos to park staff, the Rondeau Bay Waterfowlers association and the members of the Friends who worked to make the festival a success!

The Tundra swans fly nonstop from their winter grounds at Chesapeake Bay (near Washington D.C.) to Rondeau Bay. They spend their short time here feeding and resting up for the next leg of their journey non-stop to the Winnipeg area, then on to the high arctic tundra where they need to arrive by May 1st in order to have enough time to nest and raise their young. It was almost impossible to get a photo with more than 1 or 2 of them with their heads out of the water...they come up for air and then right back down again!

New Birds arriving daily....Rondeau is a Winner!

The bay has been jammed packed with thousands of ducks, geese and swans including merganser, scaup, bufflehead, pintail and canvasback ducks, large flocks of tundra swans having been arriving near dusk to spend the overnight in the bay.
Large flocks of grackles and red winged blackbirds are making their way over Lake Erie and filling the trees along the shore, smaller flocks of American robins are also arriving.
Sandhill cranes and killdeer have also been spotted.

March break Visitor Centre hours

Open every day from 10 am to 4 pm during March break.

Welcome to Rondeau Park!

Hello everyone and welcome to the Friends of Rondeau blog where we hope to keep you updated as to what is going on at Rondeau.
This weekend March 20-21st, we celebrate the return of the tundra swans and other migrating waterfowl with "Wings of Spring".
With the beautiful spring like weather we have been having migrating birds are beginning to return to their summer nesting grounds and Rondeau is a major stopping point for rest and rejuvenation.
There will be viewing scopes set up on the pier and on the Marsh trail so that you may have a closer look out onto Rondeau bay to see what might be passing through... or what might be deciding that Rondeau is the perfect place to spend the summer!
The Rondeau Bay Waterfowlers will be once again holding bird house building workshops. Have the kids come on out and build a bird house that they can take home and hang up in their own backyard to provide shelter for a smaller avian family.
There will be a lunch BBQ available both days and hot chocolate available to warm you from your fingers down to your toes should the spring winds cause a chill.
The Marsh building and the Visitor Centre will both be open for the weekend events.