Friday September 01, 2023 was a very special day for me as I released my 750th bird for the Toronto Wildlife Centre. The majority of these birds were FLAP rescues during spring and fall migration while others came from "unique situtations" like cat attacks, string-toed pigeons, oil spills and the list goes on.
I'm glad that I decided to keep track of all my drives in and out of TWC ever since I officially became a volunteer driver back in 2014. Occasionally I will skim through the pages after entering something because some of the short notes take me back to one of these drives. A stand out moment with a bird and sometimes a stand out moment with a person who found the animal.
I had booked the day off to go see W.A.S.P. with Angie along with some of my long time pals from high school days. The lead singer Blackie Lawless has been struggling with some back issues and tried to finish this 40th anniversary tour but the pain and discomfort finally got the best of him. He hopes to get back on the road sometime in 2024. With this cancellation, I had the day to myself. Angie and my concert buds were all working. I decided to let some people at the wildlife centre know that I was available to help them with anything if need be. They thanked me and said that they would get back to me by the end of Thursday if they knew of anything by then. Great plan as if there's nothing, it gave me time to think of something else to do with my Friday off. Then as you can guess, come later Thursday they asked if I could drive a couple birds down to the lake west of Toronto for release. You know what my answer was.
I was pretty excited about this upcoming release opportunity as I knew one of these little birds was going to be my 750th release. I asked what the species were, which normally I don't because it doesn't matter what they are, I will drive them (no picking and choosing, all birds matter); but I wanted to know for this milestone. It is still summer and there's lots of leaves on the trees. More often than not, during this time of year, the birds fly out of the paper bag and quickly disappear into the trees. It's all over in a flash and I don't see much of them, let alone identify them especially fall warblers which are already a challenge as some really change their plumage between breeding season (spring) and autumn. Then if it is a female or juvenile, that can make it even more difficult. I was told there was a bay-breasted warbler and a Nashville warbler. Here are the two species as immature or possibly females, there would be slight differences if they were males but nothing significant like if it was a cardinal and a blue jay. I borrowed these images from the All About Birds website. Bay-breasted is the top bird and Nashville is the bottom. Looking at the images, you can see some differences; but if you have a split second while the tiny bird is in flight before it disappears into the foliage, you probably wouldn't pick up wing bars on the bay-breasted as one example.
I was doing this release solo (Angie joins me when possible) and wanted to somehow document it. I always hope for a photo to share but with the challenges I expected, what else could I do? Video? Yes. But how? I had lots of time to think about this before the release moment.
When the time came, I set up my phone close to where I was releasing the birds, propping it up against something and I hit record. Here is the release and you can see how quickly it happens, how tiny that bird is, and that it disappears in the trees in mere seconds. Knowing the bird was either of the two mentioned species made it much easier to look for the field marks in those seconds especially if I did lose it in the trees afterwards.
https://youtu.be/1kkRghTwCmE?si=i2V3yZIMuFY_0ZJ4
Luck was on my side and I was able to get two record shots of the bird as well.
The Nashville flew higher up in the same tree and I did not see it again.
It's funny thinking about the time building up to the release moment. Then the actual release and how quickly that ended. After the fact, I hung on to this throughout the weekend, having my own little toasts here and there. Maybe some think this is silly but man that's a lot of birds! I'm never bragging. This is something I help with in my spare time, often before work. The majority of the fall releases happen in the same area. It is a 12 km drive from home to the centre, and usually takes me 30 minutes to get there because of city traffic. Thirty minutes is good time nowadays. Then from the centre to the release area is 29 km. Again, another 30 minutes (it's mostly highway). So I've got at least one hour of driving and just over 40 km of distance to release a bird, sometimes, two, maybe four or five the odd day. Who knows until the day of pick up. The actual time spent releasing can be mere seconds to maybe five minutes. The birds don't go to our backyard or one of my favourite local birding spots like someone once suggested. Weird how some people think and the drama they try to create.
I've been asked how many animals have I brought in to the centre, followed by how many got back out to the wild again. I know the intake is near 100 but I have no idea how many got back out. It's a very busy place with thousands of animals coming in over the year and difficult to follow up on them individually. I do try at times with some of the more unique situations, especially if they've come from our neighbourhood. The people at the centre do their best for all of the creatures.
I tried to make a bird list of what I have driven. Here it is although I may be missing a couple still. The animal list is easier to keep track of and I can run it without much thought... squirrel, skunk, raccoon, opossum and a couple bats.
White-throated Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow, House Sparrow, Lincoln's Sparrow, Fox Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Dark-eyed Junco, Indigo Bunting
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Cedar Waxwing
Brown Creeper
Barn Swallow
Least Flycatcher
Yellow Warbler
Ovenbird
Blackburnian
Common Yellowthroat
Black-throated Green
Black-throated Blue
Tennesse
Orange-crowned
Northern Parula
Blackpoll
Nashville
Wilson's
Black & White
Bay-breasted
Mourning
Magnolia
Pine
Canada
Redstart
Northern Waterthrush
Chestnut-sided
Gray Catbird
Red-eyed Vireo
Blue-headed Vireo
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
Red-tailed Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
Peregrine Falcon
Great Horned Owl
Eastern Screech Owl
Mallard Duck
Wood Duck
Ring-billed Gull
Canada Goose
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray-cheeked Thrush
Swainson's
Veery
Robin
Brown Headed Cowbird
Woodcock
Common Nighthawk
Goldfinch
House Finch
Black-capped Chickadee
Northern Cardinal
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Brown Thrasher
Scarlet Tanager
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
European Starling
Black-billed Cuckoo
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
Yellow Rail
Virginia Rail
