Bird lovers and local conservation groups invite the community to Canatara Park this Saturday, May 10, to celebrate World Migratory Bird Day.
This day is a global bird conservation education campaign that is officially celebrated every year on the second Saturday of May in Canada and the U.S. Each year has a theme, and this year the focus is on shared spaces and making our communities, cities, and towns more bird-friendly.
Late last year, Sarnia received a Bird Friendly City certification from Nature Canada, joining a group of 30 other municipalities across Canada that have shown their commitment to reducing key threats to local bird populations.
A small group of volunteers known as Bird Friendly Sarnia led the efforts to win this designation for the city. They are approximately ten members strong and are loosely affiliated with the non-profit organization Lambton Wildlife Inc.
Since 2021, through their advocacy, Bird Friendly Sarnia has been able to promote measures to protect and nurture local bird populations, and promote community engagement. In May 2022, Sarnia City Council voted in support of becoming a Bird Friendly City. Since then, Bird Friendly Sarnia has worked with the City to enhance green spaces to support bird populations year-round, mitigate light pollution, and endorse Sarnia’s Official City Bird, the red-headed woodpecker.
“The certification is in three levels,” says John Cooke, the chairperson for Bird Friendly Sarnia. “We are at the entry level, so the intention would be to continue working on improving our compliance with the various certification criteria.”
The designation is reviewed every three years to make sure municipalities are keeping up with their efforts. The criteria for becoming a Bird Friendly City fall under three categories: threat reduction; habitat protection, restoration, and climate resiliency; and community outreach and education.
Sarnia’s entry status means that the municipality has at least 50% of the possible points in each category. London, Ontario is another Bird Friendly City that has achieved the highest level with over 80% in each category.
Sarnia has already adopted an official Climate Change Action Plan. “We got some initial points for having that,” says Cooke. “In the future, we’ll get additional points if some of that action plan is actually acted upon.”
The City has also mitigated light pollution by ensuring all outdoor street lights are downward-facing. Light pollution is disorienting for migrating birds and leads to more fatal collisions for them.
“We do have a cat bylaw,” Cooke adds, “but it’s kind of weak.”
Feral and domestic cats are the largest direct, human-caused threat to birds in Canada. Cats are natural predators that are not native to our ecosystem and are responsible for an estimated 75% of all bird deaths in Canada, a loss of 100 to 350 million birds a year in this country, according to Nature Canada. It is estimated that house cats in urban areas allowed to roam account for 17% of this number.
“Bird Friendly teams are encouraging people to keep their cats indoors,” says Cooke. He emphasizes that this is not only in the interest of the birds. “A house cat that is allowed outdoors has a significantly lower lifespan than one that stays inside.”
It is against Sarnia bylaws for owners to allow their cats to roam freely. Homeowners are also permitted to humanely capture cats trespassing on their property for transfer to the Humane Society by bylaw officers.
In terms of implementing further measures to improve the city's bird-friendliness, Cooke says they hope to get back to the table with the City. “We haven’t had an official discussion with them since the initial certification. We’re about ready now, over the summer and into the fall, we will start talking to the City again about what additional actions they can be taking.”
For now, Bird Friendly Sarnia is focused on engaging the community and spreading awareness. “Bird populations have dropped dramatically,” says Cooke when asked why we should care about birds. “Any bird that goes after insects in the air like a swallow or a nighthawk or a flycatcher, those birds are declining quite precipitously. Birds are a bellwether for what’s going on in the rest of the ecosystem.”
Naming the red-headed woodpecker as Sarnia’s Official City Bird was an effort to rally the community around birds. It was selected using the results of an online poll in 2023 in which around 1,500 people participated.
“It is interesting because they are quite rare in Sarnia,” Cooke tells us. “But, in the last couple of years they were nesting in Canatara Park. They nest in certain dead trees, and some of those were removed, so I’m not sure if they’ll be back this year.”
The events at Cantara Park this Saturday are another opportunity for the community to gather and connect with the beauty of birds in our own backyard. With its expansive wetlands and diverse shoreline ecosystems, Sarnia is a critical stopover for migratory birds.
“Sarnia, and particularly Canatara Park, is on a flyway north,” says Cooke. “They come through this area and go up either side of the lake on their way north to boreal forests. There’s a wide variety of warblers, vireos, thrushes, flycatchers, that are very pretty. They look great and sound great.”
The community is invited to come out at 9 a.m. to meet at the Kiwanis Log Cabin (near the animal farm) in Canatara Park to join in the events for World Migratory Bird Day. Highlights of the event include:
- Bird identification tips and a guided walk led by Annie Goulden
- A chance to meet local conservation groups, including Lambton Wildlife Inc., Bluewater Centre for Raptor Rehabilitation, and Bird Friendly Sarnia
- Learn how to support bird conservation and native habitat at home
- Aamjiwnaang Greenhouse will share traditional knowledge and plant expertise
- Golden Alexander’s Native Plant Nursery will have native plants available for sale
- A guided Kid's Birding Hike with LWI's Young Naturalist Club (pre-registration required: https://www.eventbrite.ca/.../world-migratory-bird-day…
“People who are new to birding or who want to know more about it, this would be a great opportunity for them to visit us,” says Cooke.
A few pairs of binoculars for bird watching will be available to borrow at the event. As well, the Sarnia Library has binoculars available to borrow on a weekly basis.
World Migratory Bird Day events can be found in every Bird Friendly city across Canada. Visit Bird Friendly Sarnia’s linktree to find more resources and information on local bird conservancy.