Mount Lorette (23 Sep 2023) 17 Raptors
Alberta, Canada
| Daily Raptor Counts: Sep 23, 2023 | |||
| Species | Day’s Count | Month Total | Season Total |
| Turkey Vulture | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Osprey | 0 | 3 | 3 |
| Bald Eagle | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Northern Harrier | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Sharp-shinned Hawk | 0 | 15 | 15 |
| Cooper’s Hawk | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| American Goshawk | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| Broad-winged Hawk | 2 | 3 | 3 |
| Swainson’s Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Red-tailed Hawk | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Ferruginous Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Rough-legged Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Golden Eagle | 12 | 29 | 29 |
| American Kestrel | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Merlin | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Gyrfalcon | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Peregrine Falcon | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Prairie Falcon | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Accipiter | 0 | 6 | 6 |
| Unknown Buteo | 0 | 4 | 4 |
| Unknown Falcon | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Eagle | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Raptor | 1 | 3 | 3 |
| Total: | 17 | 71 | 71 |
| Observation start time: | 09:00:00 |
| Observation end time: | 18:00:00 |
| Total observation time: | 7 hours |
| Official Counter | Neil Denton |
| Observers: | Caroline Lambert, Lynn Macintosh |
Visitors:
72 visitors in groups of up to 20.
Weather:
Ridgetop Temperatures – Start temperature @ 9am: 5C – End temperature – @6pm: 6C – Daily High Temperature: 7C
Ground Level Temperatures – Start temperature @ 9am: 7C – End temperature – @6pm: 19C – Daily High Temperature: 19C Wind – Summary of ridge wind o Primarily S or SW gusting from 14 to 89 km/h (peak) – Summary of ground wind o Primarily S or SW gusts variable â from 10km/h to 24km/h – Cloud cover and precipitation o Partly sunny, broken clouds o Short, light rainfall in late afternoon o Visibility varied significantly with periods of low cloud making observing passing migrants difficult, to almost clear skies. Flat light, with a number of eagles first showing over Fisher, made aging â and in one case identifying to genus â challenging at times.
Raptor Observations:
It was a slow start for migrant raptors. All the migrants were seen over the Mt Lorette and the east ridge (with one oddity). The number of GOEA increased to 12, of which three were not aged – in part due to the flat light, and the fact that quite a few of the eagles first shoed south of the bumps. There was a decent amount of other raptors. The totals were 12 Golden Eagles (7AD, 2SA, 3U), 0 Bald Eagles, 2 American Goshawk, 2 accipiter sp., 2 Broad-winged Hawk, and one high flying raptor that was not possible to ID.
In addition, we had one Merlin in in the trees near the observation location.
Better yet was the curious case of the Turkey Vulture flying north from as far south as we could see until it disappeared to the north.
We observed one of the resident GOEA, and one American Goshawk behaving like a non-migrant.
Non-raptor Observations:
The most exciting bird of the day was a Turkey Vulture, closely matched by a Palm Warbler immediately behind the observation site.
3 Common Merganser 1 Ring-billed Gull 1 Golden Eagle (resident) 1 American Goshawk (resident) 1 Belted Kingfisher 1 Merlin (resident) 4 Canada Jay 15 Common Raven 2 Black-capped Chickadee 1 Ruby-crowned Kinglet 110 American Robin 175 Bohemian Waxwing 5 White-winged Crossbill 2 Pine Siskin 3 White-crowned Sparrow 1 Palm Warbler 1 Wilson’s Warbler
Report submitted by ()
Mount Lorette information may be found at: eaglewatch.ca
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]
Count data submitted via Dunkadoo – [Project Details]
