Despite the spectacular scenery, fair weather, varied habitats and interesting mammals, my birding experience on Vancouver Island was somewhat disappointing. Perhaps it was the season, the brevity of my visit or pure bad luck. More likely, used to birding in Colorado, the Midwest and Florida, there are just not as many bird species in the cool, damp Northwest.
Crows, ravens and gulls dominated the scene; among the latter were ring-billed, herring, glaucous-winged and mew gulls. Cormorants were also fairly common along the rocky shore and I spotted a few Pacific loons on the Strait of Georgia. Otherwise, marine birds were limited to a single bald eagle, a couple of ospreys, a flock of surf scoters off the west coast of the island and a few black oystercatchers among the tidal pools. Beach birds were represented by crows, gulls and scattered flocks of savannah sparrows.
Birding in the rainforest was especially challenging. While songbirds chirped from the canopy, they were almost impossible to see from the ground. An occasional woodpecker (pileated, hairy or red-breasted sapsucker) moved among the towering trunks and a few red-breasted nuthatches circled up the moss-covered giants. Winter wrens and golden-crowned kinglets hunted in the understory but were more often heard than seen. Only the raucous Steller's jays, which favored the clearings and border zones, were easy to observe.
