A total of 92 species are listed in Cortes Island’s Spring 2022 Bird count. More than 20 birders participated, including local naturalist George Sirk who started the day off as a guide on board the Misty Isles. This year’s count was expanded to include Mitlenatch island, where Sirk served as a naturalist in 1969 and 71.
He remembers when there were about 450 pairs of Pelagic Cormorants, no Double Crested Cormorants and no eagles. Since then, the Pelagic population has dropped to about 250 pairs, 25 Double Crested Cormorants have arrived and a pair of Bald Eagles has taken up residence.
“The Pelagics nest on the sheer cliffs on the western side of the island. They find any kind of small shelf that will just hold them. And then they make their nests out of eel grass. It primarily is what I’ve seen up there and guano, and they glue these things together. The nest must be about 18 inches across or so and they build them up over years. Some of them are two feet high. It all withstands the southeast winds in the winter time. I guess all that guano was just like cement, it holds them together,” explained Sirk.
He added, “we used to have 3000 pairs of Glaucous-winged Gulls and I bet the population is down to about a thousand pairs. I believe it is primarily going down because of the garbage dumps. Back then, we used to have gigantic garbage dumps: Delta, Campbell River, Nanaimo, Victoria, even on Cortes right? All the garbage was jumbled together, including all the foods and compostables. So the gulls could survive the winter when fishing is very hard because the low tide is at night. They survived on the dumps, but then we cleaned up the dumps. All that wonderful recycling and then covering it up as soon as possible with soil. Then scaring the gulls away too! And because they take four years to mature, the gulls really suffered when we cleaned up. That’s my theory behind that, and I think it’s a pretty sound theory.”
When Sirk first arrived on Mitlenatch, eagles used to fly over from Cortes and some to the surrounding islands to pick off the young gulls. That ended when a pair of eagles took up residence. While they eat some of the gulls, more survive because they keep the other eagles away.
On the return trip to Cortes Island, Sirk spotted some Western Grebes.
“Fishermen used to call them hell divers, because they are the largest of the Grebes and they can dive the deepest. They’re the furthest off shore. You can see them two or three miles off the coast of Cortes and that’s their habitat. They can go hundreds of feet deep and hunt their fish,” he said.
He lists five different types of Grebes and a number of other species in the podcast.
Some of this year’s highlights on Cortes:
- Autumn Barrett-Morgan and Cory Dow spotted a Sandpiper at Linnaea Farm
- John and Sherry Sprungman observed a Golden Plover at Sprungman’s Pond.
“This cold snap that’s gripping north America really seems to have affected birds. They’re holding off a little bit in coming north. They somehow sense that the Arctic is still frozen. It’s still cold up there. All their ponds and lakes are still frozen and so they’re a little bit delayed. I’ve noticed that on Cortes too. Birds seem to be like maybe a week late or so,” said Sirk.
At this point the interview turned to questions about specific species.
Sirk said he hasn’t heard a Western Screech Owl on Cortes since the mid 80s. Barred Owls have taken over since then and eat their smaller kinsmen.
The other owl species have also declined. He is aware of a pair of Great Horned Owls at Sprungman’s pond and a Pygmy Owl that lives near Smelt Bay.
There aren’t any Northern Goshawks listed in this years count. Sirk said that’s because they’re a bird of the deep forest and keep to remote areas where there are no people.
“The only time they ever get caught coming down here is when they’re really hungry and they’ll go after some chickens perhaps. I actually, haven’t seen a ‘Goss’ here in decades. I’ve heard heard them up in Carrington, but that’s an extremely rare bird.”
He knows of five pairs of Barn Swallows on Cortes Island: in Squirrel Cove, Blue Jay Lake, the Medical Clinic, the village in Mansons Landing and Sprungman’s Pond.
There were 100-200 pairs back in the 1970s. They have one of the longest migrations of any small bird and Sirk suspects their population decline may be linked to the fact some of the countries along their route still use pesticides.
“Their population is down to one quarter of what it used to be, all across North America.”
Sirk saw a Great Blue Heron the morning the Misty Isles picked up a naturalist in Lund for the trip to Mitlenatch. He doubts there are five pairs on Cortes.
“Predation by eagles is a big problem for them.”
This is the result of a domino effect: “If you have less herring, you have less salmon for the eagles to eat. So the eagles are being very opportunistic, well adapted to eating anybody actually. They’ll turn to other species like Great Blue Herons, but if there’s lots of fish or dog fish they’re happier I think to eat that, rather than filling their mouths full of feathers.”
Hummingbirds are doing well, thanks to all the bird feeders on Cortes Island. Jerry Watson has six of them and, consequently, people have to duck when they go on his deck. Rufous Hummingbirds are the most aggressive and dart around ‘with their little pointed beaks.’ The Anna’s Hummingbirds will take a back seat until the male Rufous fly off to the Alpine Meadows of BC’s mountains. (They leave the females to raise their offspring.)
As of May 17th, 14 lists were handed in to the Cortes Island Museum. After Gina Trzesicka finished the tally, 92 different species were recorded on Cortes and Mitlenatch.
Sirk said the count doesn’t extend to population numbers, just the number of species, but he hopes to see this change.
“Every day now there’s a new species of bird arriving on Cortes and if not every day, every two or three days. That’s the wonderful thing. I step outside and they go, ‘oh, oh.’ The Warbling Vireos are back! That was two days ago and they’ve just started to sing and I’ve heard them now in different parts of the island. They come in waves and they come together. It’s quite neat. Those birds, they’re solitary in a way, but they’re arriving all at the same time. All of the Warbling Vireos come within a few days.”
Top photo credit: Black Oystercatcher enjoying a meal on the beach – Photo by George Sirk
Sign-up for Cortes Currents email-out:
To receive an emailed catalogue of articles on Cortes Currents, send a (blank) email to subscribe to your desired frequency:
- Daily, (articles posted during the last 24 hours) – cortescurrents-daily+subscribe@cortes.groups.io
- Weekly Digest cortescurrents – cortescurrents-weekly+subscribe@cortes.groups.io