The following is a guest post by Christian Artuso of Bird Studies Canada. Over the past few years he has been helping to organize and develop the Manitoba Breeding Bird Atlas, a comprehensive outlook of which birds breed in Manitoba and where. As Christian mentions below Manitoba has an extremely low population density, making the extraordinary volunteering [...]

In our last post we outlined the success of the terrific Whimbrel satellite tracking program led by the Center for Conservation Biology and partners. It has led to all sorts of new information about Whimbrels and their migration. Of particular note was the recent discovery of a new migration route being used by several Whimbrels [...]

American Black Duck.
Credit: Jeff Nadler
Yesterday several prominent conservation and wildlife organizations published The State of Canada’s Birds, a comprehensive assessment of population fluxes among birds within each major ecoregion of Canada. Released by the North American Bird Conservation Initiative (NABCI-Canada), under the leadership of Environment Canada, Bird Studies Canada, Ducks Unlimited Canada, Nature Canada, [...]

In our last post we highlighted the Northern Waterthrush – a small bird frequently found in mangroves throughout the Caribbean that heavily relies on the boreal forest up north for summer breeding.

Hope, in her wintering grounds in St. Croix
Credit: Lisa Yntema
Another bird that shares such mangrove habitat and also heavily relies on the boreal [...]

The Mackenzie River – largest in Canada
Credit: Irene Owsley
Canada’s boreal forest is big. Real big.
At 1.4 billion acres (think of two Argentinas), this lush and varied landscape spans the middle third of Canada like a green scarf. But it’s not all green. The retreat of ice from the last ice age has left the boreal [...]

This is the final update from Jean Iron, who volunteers collecting data in the remote James Bay region of northern Ontario. You can find her first post we published here. She also regularly posts her updates on the Ontario Birding listserv and has a personal bird-related website you can visit here.

Endangered rufa subspecies of the [...]

After my May trip to the spectacular and birdy Pimachiowin Aki—Land That Gives Life—area of Manitoba in late May, I had the good fortune to be introduced to Christian Artuso. As Bird Studies Canada’s Manitoba Program Manager, Christian is heading up the Manitoba Breeding Bird Atlas project and had the opportunity to do some bird [...]

We are pleased to this year again post up a guest blog entry from Jean Iron (as relayed by Ron Pittaway) from a remote part of the James Bay region of northern Ontario. Jean is part of a team doing bird surveys and research on the birds that are heading (or have already headed) our [...]

Dangerous crossing for a woodland caribou
Credit: Valerie Courtois, Canadian Boreal Initiative

It seems as though woodland caribou continue to lie at the center of environmental issues in Canada. The elusive, antlered marvels that mostly stake out grounds in old growth boreal forest continue to struggle against the one-two punch of human encroachment and the [...]

Members of the George River herd in Labrador.
Credit: Valerie Courtois, Canadian Boreal Initiative.
Woodland caribou, the nomadic and symbolic creature of Canada’s boreal forest, were once plentiful throughout mainland Canada and the northern United States. The vast stretches of forest throughout this region were perfect for the well-adapted woodland caribou, whose specialized diet allows them to eat [...]