A tiny king with a golden crown was one of the many rare guests at last month’s Christmas Bird Count in St. Albert.
About 82 people watched feeders and prowled fields and forests last Dec. 27 as part of the 2024 St. Albert Christmas Bird Count. Part of the world’s longest-running citizen science project, the count saw birders patrol a 24-kilometre circle centred on the old St. Albert Airport in search of every bird they could find.
Count co-organizer David Grinevitch said this was the first time in many years that he had enough volunteers to cover every part of the search area. It was also warm enough on count day to go outside without a toque — great for those in the field, but less so for those at home, who have more to see when the cold drives birds to their feeders.
St. Albert bird count veteran Percy Zalasky said he scouted the lands around the Grey Nuns White Spruce Park during the count. There, he saw an unidentified bird smack into an apartment window as it was fleeing a merlin.
“[The merlin] perched on the balcony [railing] for a few seconds, dropped down onto the balcony, grabbed whatever bird it was, took it to a power pole, and proceeded to eat it for the next 20 minutes,” Zalasky said.
“That was quite incredible to see that.”
Rare guests
While none of the 33 species spotted during the count were new to St. Albert, a few were particularly rare. There was the count’s second-ever barred owl, for example, and the first American tree sparrow since 2013. There were also a record number of robins and northern flickers.
Rarer still was the golden-crowned kinglet seen in Grosvenor Park. A hummingbird-sized creature with a bold lemon-yellow crest surrounded by a thick black stripe, the golden-crown kinglet was last seen during the 2007 Christmas count. Just 11 such birds have been observed during the count’s 34-year history.
“They have a very high-pitched song,” Zalasky said — so high seniors like him struggle to hear it — and hang out very high in the canopy, making them difficult to spot.
Counters also spotted 103 white-winged crossbills — the most since 2015, and far more than the zero-to-five typically seen here during the winter. Zalasky said these birds have red (male) or yellowish (female) heads, two white bars on their black wings, and hook-like crossed bills they use to pry open spruce cones.
Grinevitch said this surge in crossbills could be the result of a spruce cone shortage up north combined with a cone surplus here.
“There seem to be white-winged crossbills absolutely everywhere,” he said, with many small flocks observed during the count.
Observers didn’t see any snowy owls during the count, but did hear a great horned one at night, Grinevitch said. He personally saw a short-eared owl at Big Lake the night before the count, but it was nowhere to be seen on count day.
A mere 480 bohemian waxwings were spotted in this year’s count — strange, given that they usually show up in the thousands, and that St. Albert had a bumper crop of their favourite food (mountain ash berries) this year. Grinevitch said this could be because these birds had yet to exhaust their food supplies farther north. Large flocks had been seen in town in more recent days, suggesting they may now be arriving in force.
Data from the count will now be sent to Birds Canada to help scientists track trends in bird populations, Grinevitch said.
Visit tabsoft.co/3iw0JLI to explore this year’s count results.
