In 2016, IBA Caretaker for MB91 Riverton Sandy Bar, Joanne Smith, instigated our first ever IBA habitat work party, pulling weeds for plovers (see here, here and here). Earlier this month Joanne and a number of volunteers came back for round 2. Here Joanne gives her take on the days activities.

Volunteers making their way to the start of the weed pulling area. Copyright Joanne Smith

Hmm, the phrase “weed at the bar,” may conjure up some odd, possibly illegal, images, but August 17th was all about pulling invasive sweet clover and burdock at Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) Riverton Sandy Bar. In fact, 36 volunteers filled 66 bags of the stuff, with the hopes of creating a habitat more appealing to the Endangered Piping Plover. The last time Sandy Bar had nesting Piping Plover was in 2004. With two pairs being seen elsewhere in Manitoba this summer, there is always a possibility that Piping Plovers may once again make an appearance at Sandy Bar IBA MB091. Having annual groups pull invasive sweet clover and other weeds that are choking out the sandbar will hopefully further this cause.

Hoards of people moving across the car. Copyright Patricia Rosa

On Thursday August 17th, residents from such Interlake communities as Riverton, Arborg, Hnausa and Hodgson; volunteers from Winnipeg; and staff from the East Interlake Conservation District, Manitoba Sustainable Development, Nature Manitoba and Bird Studies Canada met at the Sandy Bar parking area at 9:00 am to participate in this work-bee organised by the Manitoba IBA program. Coffee, donuts and muffins were shared while introductions were given. Water was handed out, sun-screen splashed on, and then the real work began.

No sweat, although this photo was taken before anyone had pulled a single weed. Pretty much everyone is here. Copyright Dries Desender

The fifteen-minute walk to the sand bar was followed by hours of weed pulling. Larger, older sweet clover, new young plants, burdock and even young willow were pulled up and carefully bagged. The Piping Plover prefers an open sandy/pebble area with little or no vegetation so the goal was to pull the weeds up from the roots to try to prevent them from taking over the sandbar. This year was ‘reinforcement” following last year’s weed pull and the encouraging results we saw with the areas cleared in 2016 remaining relatively open sand.

A selection of photos of people in action. Copyright for all to Joanne Smith

On September 30^th, 2016, we were delighted to have 14 people share in the weed-pulling activity, so having 36 volunteers this year was above and beyond our hopes. Not only did we learn about Piping Plovers and the habitat that they prefer, we had individuals from different areas of expertise who shared information on the different bird species seen and heard, as well as the importance of Riverton Sandy Bar, designated as both an IBA and a Special Conservation Area.

Maybe next year we will get Rona to pay for all the free advertising! Bags and bags and bags of weeds. Copyright Joanne Smith

While the goal of the event was to pull invasive sweet clover, there were numerous sightings of birds. Along with the local summer nesting birds such as Sora, Song Sparrow, Red-winged Blackbird, Yellow Warbler, Marsh Wren, Bald Eagle and Herring Gull, there was an appearance by a Great Blue Heron and shorebird species such as American Golden Plover, Black-bellied Plover, Semipalmated Plover, Baird’s Sandpiper, Pectoral Sandpiper, Least Sandpiper, Semipalmated Sandpiper, Spotted Sandpiper, Sanderling and both Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs. Many of these migratory shorebirds are benefiting from the weed pulling activity because it gives them safe, open foraging areas as well as potential roost sites.

Black-bellied plovers on the open sand. As pointed out above, this type of species would avoid dense vegetation.  Copyright Joanne Smith

Any guesses for the number of Least and Semipalmated sandpiper in this photo? Answers to iba@naturemanitoba.ca. Copyright Joanne Smith

Ring billed, Herring, and Franklins Gulls,  Caspian, Common, and Forster’s Terns and Black-bellied Plovers. Copyright Joanne Smith

Another invasive species that cannot be rid so easily, the zebra mussels are increasingly prevalent on Lake Winnipeg’s beaches. These seem to be spelling out a ‘z’, backwards though. Copyright Joanne Smith

Busy weed puller on the go. Copyright Dries Desender

While pulling weeds in sunny 26°C temperatures was a little tiring, the event was a great success. Filling 66 bags of weeds, seeing numerous bird species and having local residents as well as individuals from various groups all come together to help create a more suitable habitat for Piping Plover was well worth the miles traveled and the effort expended.

There will be more follow-up too, because it will take several more years of effort to “get ahead” of the sweet clover and we are determined to make a difference. So stay tuned to the Manitoba IBA webpage or blog (https://importantbirdareasmb.ca/) and join the fun of our annual “weed at the bar” event!

A glimpse of the full yard waste bags. Copyright Dries Desender

Here is the most important thing, the days full bird list:

Canada Goose  125
Green-winged Teal  18
Common Goldeneye  5
American White Pelican  2
Great Blue Heron  1
Northern Harrier  1
Bald Eagle  2
Sora  1
Black-bellied Plover  6
American Golden-Plover  1
Semipalmated Plover  2
Killdeer  1
Sanderling  3
Baird’s Sandpiper  1
Least Sandpiper  8
Pectoral Sandpiper  1
Semipalmated Sandpiper  7
Spotted Sandpiper  2
Greater Yellowlegs  2
Lesser Yellowlegs  5
Franklin’s Gull  4
Ring-billed Gull  33
Herring Gull  26
Caspian Tern  6
Common Tern  9
Forster’s Tern  7
Common Raven  4
Barn Swallow  6
Marsh Wren  3
Yellow Warbler  7
Song Sparrow  2
Yellow-headed Blackbird  1
Red-winged Blackbird  28

From a Manitoba IBA Program perspective, we are obviously extremely grateful to everyone for turning up to help with special thanks to Christian and Patricia for bringing along refreshments and equipment, Thor for getting together a large group of local volunteers, East Interlake Conservation District, Manitoba Sustainable Development, Bird Studies Canada and Nature Manitoba for their support! However we cannot get by without a special note of thanks to Joanne for her amazing dedication in bringing this together. We will be back because this is a project worth pursuing!

by Patricia Rosa

On a stormy Tuesday morning, Tim and I ventured out to the North, West & East Shoal Lakes IBA (MB038). Since our plans in another IBA fell through, we decided to direct our efforts towards the Interlake region in hopes of spotting Red-headed Woodpecker and Least Bittern. Despite the less than ideal weather, we saw a “good number of pelicans”, “okay number of herons”, and were surprised at the “lack of ducks” (Tim Poole, pers. comm.).

We were off to a great start as the rain (thankfully) subsided once we arrived to the IBA and were greeted by a Great Egret near the side of the road.

Great Egret ©Patricia Rosa

East Shoal Lake was buzzing! We encountered an agitated male Bobolink and were soon able to see the source of all the excitement. A nearby female seemed to be the target audience of this one-man show. Unfortunately, another male showed up (left) and although our performer (right) was definitely more motivated than his rival, she remained close to the cool and collected male, and sure enough, they ended up flying off together!

Agitated male Bobolink attempting to impress the female ©Patricia Rosa

Two male and one female Bobolink ©Patricia Rosa

In the field beyond where the BOBO-show was taking place, we got a peek at Sandhill Crane and Great Blue Heron. On the water, we saw lots of Western Grebe, including this brave one carrying young on its back in rough waters. Although getting this grainy shot induced quite a bit of nausea, I was rather proud to have out-photoed Tim on this one (Patricia 1, Tim 0)!

Great Blue Heron ©Patricia Rosa

Grainy images of Western Grebe carrying young on back. ©Patricia Rosa

The strong winds allowed us to witness and admire the prowess of the Black Tern.

Black Tern in action. ©Patricia Rosa

When we came around to suitable Red-headed Woodpecker habitat (e.g. open understorey, standing deadwood, often with cattle grazing), we almost immediately saw two individuals. After several minutes, a bold one flew directly towards us! We had our cameras ready but were too frazzled/excited to get a good picture of it in-flight and both ended up with blurry background pictures (Patricia 0, Tim 0). However, he did stick around and proceeded to pose for us around his habitat!

Red-headed Woodpecker ©Patricia Rosa

My biggest disappointment of the day was failing to get an identifiable shot of a Red-necked Grebe. While I struggled, Tim effortlessly took a great picture (Patricia 0, Tim 1).

©Tim Poole

©Patricia Rosa

Last but not least, we saw a Least Bittern flush while scanning appropriate habitat. Although we were ready and hoping to see one, both Tim and I missed our shot despite getting a good long look (Patricia 0, Tim 0).

Towards the end of our survey, the wind started picking up and the skies started rumbling once again, and so, we headed back to Winnipeg (Final tally: Patricia 1, Tim 1).

Check out the highlights of our brief survey in this IBA and our total count!

On July 9th, a group of people descended on the relatively unknown Kinosota-Leifur Important Bird Area from as far afield as Portage la Prairie, Winnipeg, Birds Hill and Brandon. Our goal was to locate and count the globally Near Threatened Red-headed Woodpecker, a Species At Risk and a stunning species to observe and enjoy.

The IBA at Kinosota-Leifur was the brainchild of Harry Harris who once worked at the Alonsa Conservation District. It was Harry who put together the IBA information and had estimated that at least 50 pairs were present in this area. Since 1995 though, apart from some atlassing, no one had, as far as we know, tried to do a comprehensive count of this species in this area.

There is still evidence of previous efforts to conserve the Red-headed Woodpecker. Copyright Tim Poole

Red-headed Woodpeckers are a species with an interesting habitat preference. They prefer open stands of aspen with plenty of deadwood and snags for cavities. The vegetation must be short and lack dense shrubs, hence they are often present in open woodlots with cattle or horses. The dead trees must all be fairly large, around 25cm diameter at chest height (the technical term is DBH or Diameter at Breast Height).

Typical Red-headed Woodpecker habitat in the IBA. Copyright Sabina Mastrolonardo

This is a migratory species in Manitoba, wintering in the United States and returning to breed in deciduous woodlands in the centre of the continent in spring. There are also resident breeding populations in southeastern USA and southern Ontario.

Data from Breeding Bird Surveys suggest that this species has suffered a marked decline of over 65.5% in a 40 year period. According to Birdlife International, this species decline is due to:

‘Habitat degradation, as a result of the removal of dead trees and branches in urban areas (Pulich 1988), and loss of nesting habitat to firewood cutting, clear cutting, agricultural development and river channelling in rural areas (Ehrlich et al. 1992, Melcher 1998).’

As to the blitz, we really did not know what to expect. An article placed in the Neepawa Banner in the days before had managed to drum  up some interest, mainly from people form the wider area letting us know where Red-headed Woodpeckers might be discovered. We had developed a protocol which included periods of listening and playback for woodpeckers and hoped this would be sufficient even as we stepped into the unknown.

Twelve volunteers embarked on this exploration and we split into 4 groups. The search areas were split into a core area, highlighted in red and an extension area which took in areas to the west of the main highway. This second area turned out to be much wetter than expected and it was to the core area we would focus.

In the north, around Kinosota itself we had a team of Louanne, Margaret, Millie and Bill. This group turned out to be the group with the least luck – not a single Red-headed Woodpecker around Kinosota strangely. They did find some suitable habitat – one spot was especially good. On a positive note, they did get two Pileated Woodpecker, always a cracking species to find. Even more remarkable was an overhead White-faced Ibis, something more likely to pop up at Whitewater or Oak Lake. The comments from Louanne were as follows:

‘Margaret, Millie, Bill and I made 23 protocol stops during the Kinosota-Leifur IBA Blitz in search of Red-headed Woodpeckers. Most of the ‘core’ area and a little of the ‘extended’ area of Group/Zone A, were covered. Our effort began under sunny skies but after just over an hour, a cold wind brought in threatening clouds which led to rain, hampering our efforts though sunny skies did return. All observations were made from inside or a short distance from the vehicle.’

Dark clouds on the horizon. Copyright Sabina Mastrolonardo

The period of windy weather midway through the morning was especially difficult for hearing birds and the second group consisting of Eric, Carrie-Anne and Tim actually revisited suitable habitat which had scored zero woodpeckers first time – scoring a few extra Red-headed Woodpeckers in the process.

Red-headed Woodpecker flying away under dark skies. Copyright Tim Poole

This group found 11 individual Red-headed Woodpeckers, the most of any group. Interestingly they also scored their first one in Amaranth en route, on a telephone pole. Other species of note included a calling Scarlet Tanager and Black-billed Cuckoo.

All photos copyright Tim Poole

South again and our next group included Wally Jansen, Katharine Schulz and Sabina Mastrolonardo. They recorded 8 Red-headed Woodpeckers in a central area between Silver Ridge and Bluff Creek. A nice little patch of habitat. Other highlights included 6 species of flycatcher, 3 of which were another Species At Risk, the Eastern Wood Pewee, and 10 Bobolink. Interestingly, 10 Bobolink might also point towards issues for the Red-headed Woodpecker, if suitable woodland has been felled and replaced with hayland.

Finally, Garry and John surveyed the southern area, detecting 2 Red-headed Woodpeckers, interestingly the furthest west of the survey. They also grabbed a pair in the group to the norths area thanks to a tip off from a friendly farmer. The other highlight was that of finding a Great Gray Owl, not common in this type of habitat in July.

Sharp-tailed Grouse in the Kinosota-Leifur IBA. Copyright Garry Budyk

This gave us a total of 23 Red-headed Woodpeckers for the morning. not bad, but not a patch on the 50 pairs found historically. The next challenge is to try to work out whether we were missing a lot of woodpeckers or whether land-use changes in the 25 or so years since the IBA was put together have led to a large loss in habitat. Hopefully there will be more to come on this in the future. Below is the distribution of Red-headed Woodpeckers mapped. As can be seen, the current boundary is not correct and will be changed to reflect these results.

A summary of all species can be seen below. In total there were 91 species and 2048 individual birds counted, still pretty good and comparable figures to other blitzes. Ring-billed Gulls were numerous as were wetland songbirds such as Sedge Wren, Common Yellowthroat and Song Sparrow.