Birding, August 3, 2026: Hawks on the ground, eagles in the sky

Where: Reifel Bird Sanctuary, Boundary Bay (Delta)Weather: Sunny, 18–23°C The first birding of August, just before the fall fliers1 start arriving. Reifel Bird Sanctuary Marshland and distant mountains at Reifel Bird Sanctuary. We started at Reifel, which was packed in the morning with both hardcore birders and their Very Big lenses, and assorted families and holiday goers (today is BC Day here in, well, BC). We did a reverse of our usual route, which isn’t especially radical, but does give a slightly different view on things. As expected, no fall arrivals have shown up early, but the barn swallows are still hanging around. In fact, we saw one actively maintaining a nest, so at least one more batch of babies is on the way. Nic shot a billion swallows in flight. I shot a few and the results were not horrible, nor good, but somewhere in the middle. Horrigood. Most of the ponds were devoid of any waterfowl, but we did see some: A pair of Spotted Sandpipers in the pond by the viewing…