Louise led us on a meandering route to Richmond County by
way of vista points people who limit a Cape Breton journey to the Cabot Trail do
not see: East Bay, Irish Cove, Red Islands, Loch Lomond. From Hay Cove we
turned east to follow the gravel-road route through Mount Auburn and Lochside
to a body of water that reminded the old Scots settlers of one they had left
behind in the old country, Loch Lomond. With no other vehicle traffic to worry
about, we could brake for chipmunks, stop to photo late summer asters at the
side of the road, and pause to admire a rough grouse enjoying the sun in the
middle of the road. Unfamiliar cemeteries are always a lure. We paused at the
hillside cemetery overlooking the loch and found that many of gravestones
marked the final resting place of people named MacLeod, a lovely Scottish name,
I maintain. It is a moniker I have been reliably informed means ‘Son of Ugly’
in Gaelic, a secret I share with others at every opportunity.
At the Grand River estuary we had options: turn west toward aptly
named Red Head or east to Black Point. By the look of the map, the latter
looked to be the more promising option for those keen to see early-October
shorebird migrants. We turned east.
The barrier beach skirting the south side of Black Point
Lake has sandy sections. Footprints at the lake margin enabled us to know who
the local travelers might be. Birds both big and small had left their mark, but
no footprints were as numerous as those left by coyotes. I am drawn to places that
are favoured by coyotes and largely ignored by people. We saw no other humans
this day, just the way we each like it. There were birds on and about the lake:
a dozen common mergansers, a bald eagle or two, a marauding merlin intent on
making a meal out of one of the shorebirds assembled further ahead.
Nearing the narrow spike of land that juts into the
Atlantic, we saw the first evidence we’d made the right choice, semipalmated
plovers, ruddy turnstones, a couple of yellowlegs. But it was in the leeward
side of the point that the shorebird show really took flight: literally
hundreds of sandpipers exploiting the feeding riches among the beached kelp arrayed
along the shore. We settled on a viewing strategy. Rather than taking a slow amble
to see what birds might permit a close approach we decided on a ‘big sit’:
let’s park ourselves in a sheltered spot out of the wind to see what might
unfold. It was a serendipitous choice. In spades.
After a while it seemed the birds had forgotten that we were
there—or no longer cared. Drawn to the feeding opportunities just beyond our
feet, ‘peeps’—diminutive least and semipalmated sandpipers—came close enough that
we imagined we must have become virtually invisible to them—just part of the
foliage. There were others: black-bellied and golden plovers, both greater and
lesser yellowlegs, two pectoral
sandpipers and a single red knot. Others were present in their hundreds: the peeps, and especially, mostly-white
sanderlings feeding along the beach. These frequently took flight to inspect
whether feeding opportunities might be better a a bit further on the strand.
I have been a birder for much of a half-century but never
before had I experienced close approaches by shorebirds anything like those we relished
at Black Point. By the end of our big sit we had identified a dozen species of
shorebird and I managed to get worthy photos of almost all of them.
My well-established habit is to rate events on a 10-point
scale of delight. Rarely am I so overboard about a day in the great outdoors as
to award a mark as high as 9, but at Black Point I couldn’t help it: given the
landscape, the birds, the weather—and of course the joyful companionship—I had
no reason to award anything but a 10.
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