Mount Lorette (13 Oct 2025) 69 Raptors
Alberta, Canada
| Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 13, 2025 | |||
| Species | Day’s Count | Month Total | Season Total |
| Turkey Vulture | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Osprey | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| Bald Eagle | 3 | 36 | 40 |
| Northern Harrier | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| Sharp-shinned Hawk | 0 | 157 | 187 |
| Cooper’s Hawk | 0 | 10 | 14 |
| American Goshawk | 0 | 9 | 15 |
| Broad-winged Hawk | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| Swainson’s Hawk | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Red-tailed Hawk | 0 | 18 | 40 |
| Ferruginous Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Rough-legged Hawk | 5 | 14 | 14 |
| Golden Eagle | 61 | 1310 | 1452 |
| American Kestrel | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Merlin | 0 | 8 | 13 |
| Gyrfalcon | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Peregrine Falcon | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| Prairie Falcon | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Accipitrine | 0 | 5 | 11 |
| Unknown Buteo | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| Unknown Falcon | 0 | 1 | 3 |
| Unknown Eagle | 0 | 4 | 5 |
| Unknown Raptor | 0 | 5 | 11 |
| Total: | 69 | 1581 | 1826 |
| Observation start time: | 08:00:00 |
| Observation end time: | 17:00:00 |
| Total observation time: | 8.5 hours |
| Official Counter | Dan Parliament |
| Observers: | Cindy Parliament |
Visitors:
There were 15 interested visitors today. Special thanks to Caroline for joining us in the afternoon, and to Cindy for extending her planned short visit to a full day to assist as an AO.
Weather:
The opening temperature was -6 C and stayed cool until mid afternoon with final temperatures of -1 C. The ground winds were basically non-existent, and the wind gauge swung from SW to West to SW to SE to North to West in the calm air. Ridge winds were assessed as “Low” (< 10 km/hr) to "Medium" (11-40 km.hr) later in the afternoon, and generally from the South. The High winds from the Nakiska weather station reported an unprecedented wind reading of calm. The skies were overcast from 20 % in the morning and increasing to 60 % throughout the day. The West ridges were obscured over Nakiska, Hummingbird Plume and Mt Lorette, while the East ridges were clear all day.
Raptor Observations:
A total of 69 raptor migrants were observed during the day of three species. The flight consisted of 61 Golden Eagles (42 Adults, 9 Juveniles, and 10 Unaged), 3 Bald Eagles (3 First Year), and 5 Rough-legged Hawks, including one stunning dark morph. Due to the non-existent ground winds and adverse ridge and non-existent high winds the migration flight path was very low, and the migrants rarely peeped over the tops of the ridges. Locating the migrants was challenging due to the low flight path as the birds disappeared into the face, or flew behind “Patrick” to disappear and never reappear. If located in the face of “Patrick” the migrants were flapping, and attempting to soar, and often flying in circles attempting to gain elevation.
Non-raptor Observations:
There were no observations of resident raptors today. Other observations were a flight of 40 migratory Canada Geese in the early morning sun, 8 Mountain Chickadees, 2 Boreal Chickadees, 2 Golden-crowned Kinglets, 1 Belted Kingfisher, 7 American Robin, 6 Dark-eyed Junco, 14 Common Raven, 3 European Starling, 1 Killdeer, and 1 Clarke’s Nutcracker.
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Mount Lorette information may be found at: eaglewatch.ca
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]
Count data submitted via Trektellen.org – [Project Details]
