After seeing multiple e-Bird alerts for the Dickcissel, we headed out in the morning on Friday for a short drive south to try and find this rare bird. We found the birds on McCallum Line just a bit west of Brigden Road.
The male Dickcissel was in a dead tree on the roadside signing his distinctive song. As we watched him, we noted the female was across the road in a small shrub. Eventually we observed a female with nesting material in her beak and also observed the male pursuing her in courtship behavior.
The Dickcissel is a grassland bird, which makes it tough for them to find habitat in a heavily agricultural area like Lambton County. If we had more tallgrass prairie areas in the county we might see more of these birds!
Several Dickcissels were seen at Dow Wetlands on July 1st and also at Blackwell Park on July 2nd.