We went on the river June 10, 11, and 12th this year, the 25th anniversary of the Society and this trip. Things went relatively smoothly, although we picked up a couple rocks and twigs the second day that slowed the jetboat down considerably on Saturday.There was no place to take the boat out of the water to clean them out and we lost a couple of hours. The numbers of birds on the river were pretty good considering the amount of snow that Calgary had over the previous 6 weeks. I don't have the totals right now but will post them later. The eyries were about average comp[ared to what we have usually seen. On the dam however things were bad. We had only three nests and one appeared to be a second try for that pair. The young were newly hatched, much too young to band in that nest. The other two eyries had healthy young with 6 in one of them. We shot lots of video this year some of which will be posted on Youtube. There are some stills that will posted here directly. 

On Friday March 5th Scott Glover and his mom visited the Shelter with a donation. Scott has generously donated the money from a fund-raiser he conducted. Thanks Scott! Great stuff. (See the Gallery) 

  Although there have been reports of Snowy owls as early as mid-October (3 reports) we haven't had any at the Shelter.  On the other hand there have been a recent flurry of Goshawks (2), young Red-tails, (4) a Great Grey owl , a young Golden eagle found hungry on the reserve at Hobbema and a young Bald Eagle found shot near Slave Lake.  We don't get many birds that are shot.  The last Bald was probably 1988 and is still here.  Over the past 10 years the popular target has been Merlins in the city although that too seems to have lost its popularity.  This Bald, a large young female appears to have picked up some bird-shot that broke her wing and grounded her for maybe 10 days before we got her.  The surgery on October 31 applied a plate to the break. It will be some weeks before we know the outcome.

In other news,after 26 years heating with propane we will be shifting to natural gas the first week of November.  It will be an interesting change considering it costs $100 a week to heat the building in winter.  I have to say that Apollo Propane has been good to us over the years and we will continue to be a customer for some of the outbuildings, old habits never die.

Our ever popular Saturday work crew has been busy, fixing aviaries, administering to our mouse colony, moving shaking  and keeping things up-to-date.  Many thanks to the guys who come out for those.We will be starting some basic roof repair soon.

On a sad note the Imperial Bingo Association has been forced to close the Flamingo Bingo hall at Millbourne Shopping Centre.  There will be a void for many of the ardent bingo fans in that area.  Many thanks to all our volunteers there that helped through these past few months and years, Ron, Rena, Flora, Danny, Ellie, Leona in administration, thanks to everyone past and present. We wish hem success when they reopen in their new yet-to-be-announced venue.

KG

 

Further to last year's nest, this year the eagles laid again, this time on March 23rd. It was in the same place but with two eggs.  They were doing really well until the heavy snow storm hit on April 21st and destroyed the netting in the aviary.  They continued with the eggs for another two days until we put them inside and collected the eggs which were unfertile. Maybe next year....

Since then we have been busy rebuilding the aviary which lost one corner pole.  We will replace it as soon as the frost is out of the ground.

Click the "Read more" link for a picture.

 

 read more ...

On March 27 of last year we were feeding in the large aviary when the Bald Eagles started acting strangely. The large female was defending an area underneath some scaffolding (courtesy of Spar Aviation) that was used as a feeding area. Eva announced that she thought they were making a nest. It didn't seem likely.

Click here to read more...

 

We went on the river June 10, 11, and 12th this year, the 25th anniversary of the Society and this trip. Things went relatively smoothly, although we picked up a couple rocks and twigs the second day that slowed the jetboat down considerably on Saturday.There was no place to take the boat out of the water to clean them out and we lost a couple of hours. The numbers of birds on the river were pretty good considering the amount of snow that Calgary had over the previous 6 weeks. I don't have the totals right now but will post them later. The eyries were about average comp[ared to what we have usually seen. On the dam however things were bad. We had only three nests and one appeared to be a second try for that pair. The young were newly hatched, much too young to band in that nest. The other two eyries had healthy young with 6 in one of them. We shot lots of video this year some of which will be posted on Youtube. There are some stills that will posted here directly. 

On Friday March 5th Scott Glover and his mom visited the Shelter with a donation. Scott has generously donated the money from a fund-raiser he conducted. Thanks Scott! Great stuff. (See the Gallery) 

  Although there have been reports of Snowy owls as early as mid-October (3 reports) we haven't had any at the Shelter.  On the other hand there have been a recent flurry of Goshawks (2), young Red-tails, (4) a Great Grey owl , a young Golden eagle found hungry on the reserve at Hobbema and a young Bald Eagle found shot near Slave Lake.  We don't get many birds that are shot.  The last Bald was probably 1988 and is still here.  Over the past 10 years the popular target has been Merlins in the city although that too seems to have lost its popularity.  This Bald, a large young female appears to have picked up some bird-shot that broke her wing and grounded her for maybe 10 days before we got her.  The surgery on October 31 applied a plate to the break. It will be some weeks before we know the outcome.

In other news,after 26 years heating with propane we will be shifting to natural gas the first week of November.  It will be an interesting change considering it costs $100 a week to heat the building in winter.  I have to say that Apollo Propane has been good to us over the years and we will continue to be a customer for some of the outbuildings, old habits never die.

Our ever popular Saturday work crew has been busy, fixing aviaries, administering to our mouse colony, moving shaking  and keeping things up-to-date.  Many thanks to the guys who come out for those.We will be starting some basic roof repair soon.

On a sad note the Imperial Bingo Association has been forced to close the Flamingo Bingo hall at Millbourne Shopping Centre.  There will be a void for many of the ardent bingo fans in that area.  Many thanks to all our volunteers there that helped through these past few months and years, Ron, Rena, Flora, Danny, Ellie, Leona in administration, thanks to everyone past and present. We wish hem success when they reopen in their new yet-to-be-announced venue.

KG

 

Further to last year's nest, this year the eagles laid again, this time on March 23rd. It was in the same place but with two eggs.  They were doing really well until the heavy snow storm hit on April 21st and destroyed the netting in the aviary.  They continued with the eggs for another two days until we put them inside and collected the eggs which were unfertile. Maybe next year....

Since then we have been busy rebuilding the aviary which lost one corner pole.  We will replace it as soon as the frost is out of the ground.

Click the "Read more" link for a picture.

 

 read more ...

On March 27 of last year we were feeding in the large aviary when the Bald Eagles started acting strangely. The large female was defending an area underneath some scaffolding (courtesy of Spar Aviation) that was used as a feeding area. Eva announced that she thought they were making a nest. It didn't seem likely.

Click here to read more...