THE NEST BOX, NUMBER 25, SUMMER 2009
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009 SHIRLEY’S BAY SANCTUARY TURNS 80
.jpg)
The following is an edited version of an article by Churchy that was published in Trail & Landscape, the official publication of the Ottawa Field-Naturalists Club. A few copies are available for ODC members to read.
The Shirley’s Bay Crown Game Preserve recently turned 80 years old. Our sanctuary was created on May 21, 1929 through a Letter of Agreement between Ontario’s Department of Game and Fisheries and the federal Department of National Defence. Today it is one of the very few crown game preserves left in the province.
The rifle range itself had been created in 1921 for the Dominion of Canada Rifle Association. In addition to housing the range, Shirley’s Bay at that time was also the home of DND’s only airbase used by both wheeled aircraft and flying boats, then in general use due to the scarcity of airfields.
In those days much of the area around Shirley’s Bay was farmland, including some of the land set aside for the sanctuary. The rest of the preserve consisted of areas that were too swampy to cultivate.
Shirley’s Bay itself has long been known as a prime staging area for waterfowl and as concerns about declining populations of various species began to grow, the founders of the Ottawa Duck Club worked out a deal, in July 1967, to manage about 120 hectares of the sanctuary on behalf of the military. Over the years, subsequent agreements expanded the club’s operations to cover the wetlands and creeks within the sanctuary.
During the 1960s and 70s Duck Club members and military personnel together created a series of ponds to improve habitat for waterfowl. By the mid-70s the club’s man-made ponds covered about 15 hectares. With later construction, that figure would now probably be closer to 24 hectares. Besides ducks, these ponds support a wide variety of wildlife species, including fish, frogs, turtles and aquatic mammals.
How big is our sanctuary? Back when the Duck Club was younger we used to say that the sanctuary covered 2,600 acres. This translates as 1,058 hectares. Somewhere along the way the 2,600 acres became 2,600 hectares or 7,000 acres. Sounds impressive, but unfortunately, it’s wrong. We’ve also used 4,000 acres, but that’s wrong too. Actually, that 2,600-acre figure was right all along.
PRESIDENT FOR LIFE
We celebrated another anniversary at our Annual General Meeting back in March. The AGM marked 20 years since Bill Bower became our president. We decided he should not get time off for good behaviour, he’s stuck with the job for life. By pure coincidence, it was also Grant Hopkins’ 20th anniversary as past president. Members who missed the AGM also missed a great cake courtesy of Mary Lou Porter.

Grant and Bill can’t wait to get at the cake. Photo by Mary Lou
www.ottawaduckclub.com
Hands up all those who visited our Website recently? I’m not seeing many hands. Hands up all those who’ve posted something on our Website? Even fewer. Our Webmaster, Ron St. Louis, has designed the site so that all of us can use it. Every issue of The Nest Box is posted there, and the grainy little black and white pictures in the newsletter look a whole lot better there in full colour.
You can also leave comments about the newsletter—what you liked, what you didn’t like and what you’d like to see in the next one. Maybe you have a message you’d like to pass on to other members—a rare bird sighting or a good source of suet or birdseed. You can leave it there too. Try it out.
There’s also a link to Flickr where members are posting great pictures taken (mostly) at the sanctuary.
RECENT OUTINGS/NEWS
(Recent is a relative term. This newsletter was started when there was still snow on the ground.)

Our great blue herons returned to the heronry in March. ODC members out on March 27 saw five or six pairs on or near their nests, some doing what herons do to create more herons.
In early April, some eastern bluebirds were seen near Innes Point. We have still been unable to entice them to our side of the sanctuary. On the 13th, Bill declared that
“Mary Lou is a good turtle spotter. We found a Blanding’s turtle in a pond not far from the big marsh and saw a second one but couldn’t capture it. That was in the same area where Ben, Tom and I found two on Saturday.
“We also saw a ruffed grouse, pied-billed grebe, red-tailed hawk, turkey vulture and a pair of kestrels near McCabe Bridge. Watched the kestrels hovering and flying to the ground to catch insects. No bluebirds seen but lots of tree swallows.”
On the 24th, Tom Irwin and Austin Taverner found that the culvert between Willow Pond and Dividend Pond was blocked so Dividend Pond was quite low. They managed to clear it enough to get water flowing but said more work would be required.
They heard a sora (or maybe it was a Virginia rail) very close but never did see it. Austin says “there are several in Dike pond, or one that travels a lot. Tom sighted the great egret flying near Willow Pond and we had a good view.
“Bill should be happy that the duck box we put on a tree near Dividend Pond had two hooded merganser eggs—Bill selected the new tree during the winter as the old tree holding the box had fallen.”
Speaking of Bill, he reported seeing lots of wood ducks at Petrie Island so we should have a good year there.
A bear was seen somewhere at the sanctuary in mid May. At the time this is being written, it has not disturbed the nest boxes around our ponds, nor has it been seen by club members. Let’s hope that continues.
Other sightings include green herons, bitterns, spotted sandpipers, common terns, common gallinules, blue-winged teal, a great egret, yellow warblers, tree swallows and even purple martins and eastern bluebirds. The latter two species haven’t yet decided to nest on our site, but we’re still hopeful.
Earlier this spring, there was a phoebe’s nest with eggs on the tray behind the old outhouse, but it was destroyed by forces unknown. Happily, the phoebe built a new nest and fledged four chicks, inside our dilapidated metal shed.
And Austin sent this update on wood duck and hooded merganser stats to May 15th, 2009, along with a few observations:
- To date we have 316 WD and 240 HM eggs laid. These totals are lower than the actual numbers as in many cases females in the nests have prevented an accurate count.
- 44 out of 62 boxes have been used by WD or HM females—well I suppose the males did contribute!
- The 240 HM egg count is the highest we’ve recorded in the summer count boxes—2008 had 181 and 2007 had 168.
- Our WD total should increase as we are early in the season (450 – 480 is typical).
- We’ve already had one nest (box 177) abandoned due to two females laying eggs in the same box. It appears that a disturbance occurred in the box—probably a fight—and the nest was abandoned. I suspect that we will have more abandoned nests as we’ve recorded several boxes that are shared by wood ducks and hooded mergansers—HM in nest one week and WD the next.
- So far our WD / HM box observation crews have been diligent, and we’ve been lucky enough to get in most weeks, so I’ve got lots of stats.
One of Jim Sauer’s friends took two of our old, run-down purple martin houses and refurbished them. He kept one and gave us the other so next year we will essentially have a brand new one to put up. Let’s hope the martins come back and make use of it. Ben Mancini did some research and found that martins often will not return to a spot where they’ve experienced predation, so maybe we will need to find a new location for the apartments.
Box 150
While doing his weekly box checks on July 10, Ben found four wood duck chicks in box 150 and decided to return later with his camera. When he (and his posse) got back, there were five little ducklings in the box. We figured that if we went back after supper, we might be able to watch them leave the nest, but when Ben opened the box, they had all gone, but there was a sixth in the process of pecking its way out of the egg. Bill could hear the mother calling from behind us and Churchy spotted the five ducklings in the reeds across Narraway Pond.
A final check on July 17 revealed that eight eggs had hatched, two did not and two chicks had died.
ODC BLUEBIRD BOXES
(Anthony and Gretchen Denton have been looking after the club’s bluebird boxes for the last several years. Anthony wrote this article for us.)
It has been a few years now since my wife and I took on the responsibility of maintaining the bluebird boxes at Shirley’s Bay. The total number of eastern bluebirds nesting in the boxes has been exactly zero, in spite of the effort which has gone into preparing boxes to meet the specifications and recommendations of successful bluebird societies, however we are encouraged by the fact that these birds do nest nearby, so we are still looking for the factor which is critical in making bluebirds decide where to nest.
The most important requirement is the habitat, the bluebird needing short grass in which to feed on insects. Next requirement is a cavity in which to nest, and this is commonly provided by a nesting box, the dimensions of which are fairly standard.
At ODC the efforts to encourage bluebirds to nest have been rewarded by having large numbers of tree swallows fighting for the boxes, a situation which existed when the author started maintaining the boxes. It seems that tree swallows do not like to nest close to each other, so recommended practice now is to place two boxes close together so that the swallow will take one, leaving the other free for a bluebird. (There has also been one wren nest).
There are now 14 pairs of bluebird boxes which are made to follow a particular specification, while all other boxes have been classed as swallow boxes and are accorded second-class status. Distant boxes were removed, as being too difficult to check, and when boxes decayed or needed repair they were also removed. The bluebird boxes are checked during the nesting season, ideally every week but in practice every second week, and their status recorded. The swallow boxes are cleaned at the end of the season, that’s all.
Times are changing, with the reports of diminishing numbers of swallows everywhere, except ODC. Now we have plans to check the swallow boxes in the nesting season and are repairing and reinstalling old boxes. During the summer bluebird boxes may be put up along the Perimeter Road, where the grass verges are mown regularly.
What is a bluebird box? It is one of a pair of boxes made of one-inch thick unfinished white cedar. One side is hinged at the bottom, with a handle to pull it open and a Robertson screw to secure it. This screw is marked with red paint. (NB. Because of the declining swallow numbers, we are planning to build and install more boxes.)
Update: Tony and Gretchen have been helping Barc Dowden with his bluebird trail on Timm Drive. On June 19nd, they found four small blue/green eggs, in a cup-shaped nest lined with pine needles in one of the boxes. “There were some aspects of the egg colour and the nesting material which made us doubt that this was a bluebird nest, and Gretchen spent a lot of time researching what other bird lays similar eggs. Today we went for a second look, and a female bluebird flew out of the box! She perched on a branch watching us, so we left her alone but will keep an eye on that box.”
When they returned next, there were four newborn chicks in the box.
.jpg)
Updater: Following that good news, Tony, Ben and Tom got together at Tony’s house to build a new supply of 50 bluebird boxes. That should keep us going for some time.
TOM’S EXCELLENT ADVENTURES: GALAPAGOS
(When Tom is not at the sanctuary, he’s usually off on some nature adventure. Here’s his account of a trip to the Galapagos last year.)
In February 2008, my wife & I spent eight days on a boat touring the Galapagos Islands. We wanted to see the fabled giant tortoises, the renowned Darwin’s finches and of course the land and conditions which led Darwin to propose his theory of Evolution through Natural Selection. A break from snow and sunshine was a distant thought.
Known originally as the Enchanted Isles, they form an archipelago of about 60 islands and islets all in an area about 100 km by 100 km, located approximately about 1,000 kms west of the Ecuadorian coast. Created through tectonic plate movements, the youngest islands (about 750,000 years old) still have active volcanoes, while the oldest islands (about 10 million years old) have extinct volcanoes and are slowly sinking below the sea. In fact, the entire area is moving at a rate of 10 cms per year towards the Ecuadorian coast (mark your calendars for the collision 100 million years from now, ed.) all islands sit in the crystal clear, blue Pacific Ocean, bathed by at least three separate ocean currents. The islands vary in size, shape, elevation and weather conditions but all are usually hot and dry and composed of volcanic rock and ash––harsh but beautiful. It is not hard to image primitive life crawling from these seas to the still warm lava and struggling to survive millions of years ago.
We flew from the Ecuadorian capital of Quito in the Andes, at 3,300 metres and 18◦C, to the island of Baltra, at sea level and 30◦C, where we were met by Mauricio, our guide, naturalist and representative of GAP Adventures of Toronto. Quite a change but we adjusted quickly with no ill effects.
We were whisked away by bus to our boat, the Pelicano, on which we would travel, eat, sleep, see wildlife, enjoy adventures and make new friends for the next eight days. It was gleaming, white, floating on a blue sea under a sunny, cloudless sky. The warm climate was a welcome change from snow bound Ottawa. We were quickly introduced to the crew of six and 12 other passengers, our cabins and our first cocktail. A great start.
The short trip from the airport to the boat had given us our first inkling of what the Galapagos would be like––sparkling clear blue warm waters surrounding hard, harsh, dry, hot, volcanic islands with little soil and sparse vegetation. We later walked upon these islands and marvelled that creatures from afar had not only managed to survive but evolve and prosper under such difficult conditions––a tribute to the toughness and adaptability of life forms.
The Galapagos were discovered by a storm driven ship in the mid-1500s and have since seen pirates, whalers, settlers, foreign animals and now tourists and a National Park. In general, these events have not been beneficial to the islands nor the creatures living there. Currently, about 25,000 people live on the islands. The Ecuadorian Government is moving to reduce that number to protect the environment and the fauna.
The Islands and villages form a National Park administered by a Parks Board and aided by the Charles Darwin Research Centre in Ayora. Tourism is the main business and non-residents can enter the islands only with registered guides. The cost was $110 US and these fees represented virtually the total revenue of the Park system. Ayora is the main town, a tourist centre on the island of Santa Cruz. It has the normal tourist facilities, but on a small scale, as large scale resorts have not been permitted. The residents have fought successfully so far to keep the tourist developments small.
Our tour focused on the geology of the islands, the marine creatures and plant life, and the efforts of researchers to study the creatures themselves and to protect the environment for their benefit. A typical day started at 06:30 and consisted of three meals on board interspersed by short Zodiac trips to nearby islands for wildlife viewing through hiking or snorkelling.
The boat usually traveled at night, frequently for six or seven hours, so it was a pleasure in the morning to wake and see a new beautiful spot. The exception was one half day in Ayora, visiting the Charles Darwin research centre and buying souvenirs. I estimated we sailed at least 400 kms island hopping, at a speed of 10kms per hour. A few times, conditions were quite rough by this land-lubber’s standard. I have now added seasickness pills to the list of medications essential to maintain life.
We saw or were introduced to the five things for which, in my mind, these inlands are famous, (1) giant tortoises, (2) Darwin’s ground finches, (3) marine iguanas and (4) Charles Darwin and (5) volcanoes. The tortoises, finches and iguanas were fascinating in that they are living proof of evolution which led Darwin to propose his famous theory in the mid-1800s. In Darwin’s time, it was a radical theory, but since then, the advance of science and intense long-term studies of the conditions affecting and changing these creatures has shown that his theory was correct. Today, through DNA analysis, it is known where these creatures originated and hence how they have changed. The 10 different species of giant tortoise evolved from a single, small ancestor in the Andes highlands. The 13 species of finches evolved from a single ancestor from the Ecuadorian mainland. We saw several kinds of volcanoes, with different sizes, shapes, colours, lavas and crater lakes, all harsh and starkly beautiful.
We saw many creatures during our Galapagos voyage. There were hundreds of sea lions and blue-footed boobies, many great and magnificent frigatebirds and their breeding colony, swallow-tailed gulls, red-billed tropicbirds, hundreds of marine and land iguanas, ground finches, sharks, thousand of colourful fish, manta rays, hundreds of golden rays, fur seals, Galapagos hawks, Galapagos penguins, flamingos, pelicans, snakes, lizards, tarantulas, about 10 giant tortoises of the species endemic to the Highlands of Santa Cruz, and last but not least, Lonesome George, the last Galápagos pinta tortoise on the Island of Santiago. (George is said to be over 90 years old and at his sexual peak! He has shown an interest in two females Espanola tortoises and may have fertilized their eggs. Ed.) The most recent addition to the bird life occurred about 10 years ago with the arrival of cattle egrets so the process still continues.

Penguins, pelican and blue-footed booby.
The tour was immensely interesting and well conducted by the Naturalist Leader and the boat’s crew. I bought a DVD which shows the volcanoes and wildlife of the Galapagos as well as a book called “A Natural History of the Galapagos by Michael Jackson, professor at the University of Calgary. Both were interesting and I would be happy to lend them should someone want to enjoy them.
Memberships and donations
At press time, we have 41 members paid up for 2009, including new members—Kim Laroque and Dan Dufour. Welcome to the club Kim and Dan. Hope we can see you at the sanctuary one day soon. By my count that leaves 14 members still outstanding. If you’re in this group, you’ll find a renewal form with this newsletter. Please come back to the fold.
This issue is a little bit late, but it’s not too late to thank Barc Dowden, Dave Martin, Joe Bevk, Bill Bower, Dr. Ron Tasker, Ab McLaren, Pat Crook and Gary Booth for their generous donations last year.
As noted above, Tony and Gretchen have been helping Barc with his bluebird trail on Timm Drive. That’s because Barc has run into some health problems recently. Word is that he is getting better, and that’s great news. We all wish Barc a speedy recovery.
CHURCHY’S COLUMN
Birds vs Windows
Everyone, at some point in life, dreams about how wonderful it would be to fly like a bird. But it’s not all sweetness. There are hazards that await the unsuspecting birds and one of the biggest is windows. The problem is pretty straightforward: birds can’t see windows so they often fly into them and the result is usually fatal. The toll may be as high as 900 million birds a year in the U.S. alone. Surprisingly, head injuries and not broken necks are the most common cause of death.
In the December 2008 edition of Birder’s World, David Allen Sibley looked into the issue and reviewed a number of ideas to reduce the toll windows are taking on birds. He found that most of the suggestions had serious drawbacks: putting decals in the shape of falcons on the windows is ineffective; hanging CDs on a string is ugly; putting up screens outside the windows is labour-intensive and installing windows angled toward the ground is expensive.
So, what can we do? Sibley’s first suggestion is to move bird feeders—they should be either within two feet of windows or more than 30 feet away. If there are more collisions with some particular windows, move feeders away from them. Don’t wash the windows, or soap them to reduce reflections. One experiment he found partially effective was simply drawing grid lines with a yellow highlighter on the inside of the window. Ultraviolet light makes the ink glow, making it more noticeable to the birds. He reports a 75% reduction in collisions, but the lines don’t work on cloudy days and they fade quickly on sunny days. When he tied strands of monofilament fishing line across the outside of the windows, about three inches apart, collisions were eliminated completely, but a reader who tried the same trick said it didn’t work for her.
He believes the best solution is to install exterior screens or netting. You can make your own, or buy from the Bird Screen Company (www.birdscreen.com). For more information on his experiments, check out his blog at http://sibleyguides.blogspot.com.
One idea he doesn’t mention is using ultraviolet coatings on windows. In January the Ottawa Citizen reported on a science project by 13-year-old Charlie Sobcov who applied a UV coating to electrostatic vinyl that sticks to windows. The coating is clear for humans, but looks coloured to birds. There is also a company in the U.S. called Duncraft (www.duncraft.com) that makes decals based on the same principle. If any ODC members try any of these ideas out, we’d like to hear the results.




