October 5 [Day 16] (Terry Waters, assisted by Rod Smith) Cloudless skies again allowed the temperature to fall to -9C at 0815, but it reached a high of 7C at 1600 before falling to -2C at the end of the day. Ground winds were again light or calm, mainly NE becoming mainly SE after 1500, while ridge winds were probably light NNW for most of the day. Scattered cumulus (5-10%) developed after 1100, and 20% cirrus after 1600 when it also became hazy, possibly because of smoke. The mainly blue skies made observation difficult, although most birds soared over Mount Lorette, quickly glided to the northern end of the Fisher Range where they again soared before moving above the range to the SE. The first raptor of the day was a juvenile Sharp-shinned Hawk seen perched near the site at 0820, but the first moving bird was a Golden Eagle at 1001 which, like the next three eagles, were the only ones seen on the western route, soaring above Olympic Summit. The movement of the day's 55 migrants was steady to 1500 followed by an hiatus of 2 hours during which time only 3 birds occurred, then the last 18 migrated between 1700 and 1817. The total comprised 3 adult Bald Eagles, 1 juvenile Sharp-shinned Hawk, 1 adult Cooper's Hawk, 1 adult Northern Goshawk, 3 adult light morph calurus Red-tailed Hawks, 45 Golden Eagles (29a,3sa,5j,8u) and the season's third Peregrine Falcon (an adult). The day's last Golden Eagle was the 500^th of the season. The Kananaskis River yielded 4 Mallards, a very late male Harlequin Duck, 2 Belted Kingfishers (1 male,1u) and 10 American Pipits, while other birds seen included 8 Golden-crowned Kinglets, 50 Pine Siskins, and a season-first 18 Common Redpolls in a single flock.

10.5 hours (175.51) BAEA 3 (26), SSHA 1 (36), COHA 1 (7), NOGO 1 (9), RTHA 3 (14), GOEA 45 (500), PEFA 1 (3) TOTAL 55 (612)

Piitaistakis-South Livingstone (Denise Cocciolone-Amatto) Observing from the upper Frank Slide site between 1530 and 1800 Denise counted 23 migrant raptors comprising 1 adult Bald Eagle, 3 Northern Harriers, 2 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 1 Cooper's Hawk and 16 Golden Eagles (5a,2sa,7j,2u).

The further adventures of “Elaine” (Golden Eagle #78453)

Elaine, an adult female Golden Eagle was captured and fitted with a transmitter during the third week of October, 2010 by Rob Domenech and his colleagues from the Raptor View Research Institute in Montana. She spent the winter of 2010-11 in the Paradise Valley just south of Livingstone, Montana and just north of Yellowstone National Park. In the spring of 2011 she moved north, roosting for a night (March 12) along the way on Bluff Mountain just west of our Piitaistakis-South Livingstone site and the next day crossed Mount Lorette on her way north. By early April she had reached the southern flank of the Philip Smith Mountains of the Brooks Range in northeastern Alaska where she spent the summer. Rob informed me that it was not known if she bred there.

In the fall of 2011 Elaine started her southward journey on October 1 and had reached the Yukon by October 7, and then slowly moved to the SE and on October 26 she was in the northernmost part of the Rocky Mountains of NE BC. Four days later she was in northern Montana having moved rapidly along the Front Range expressway, after which she continued to make a a leisurely progress south before wintering again in Paradise Valley in southern Montana.

In the spring of 2012 Elaine probably entered Alberta on March 8 and after moving up the Front Ranges spent the night of March 10 in the vicinity of Mount Lorette. She subsequently moved NW into NE British Columbia then through the Yukon and NE Alaska and on April 7 she reached her home range in the Philip Smith Mountains of the Brooks Range where she presumably nested last year.

This Fall she started her fourth migration carrying a transmitter, moving to the ESE around September 25 and by October 1 she was just west of the Alaska-Yukon border. She has since moved SE into the Yukon and on October 4 was near the Bonnet Plume River between the eastern end of the Werneke Mountains and the Bonnet Plume Range of the northern Selwyn Mountains.

You can follow her progress on a map on the seaturtle.org site via the link on our website. Many thanks to Rob Domenech and his colleagues from the Raptor View Research Institute in Montana for sharing this information with us.