Linda's Canadian Adventure

The lovelife of the Wood Duck can take place at Burnaby Lake in one of the nestboxes. I have attended a volunteer training in order to help prepare the nestboxes for the coming season on sunday afternoon. There are nestboxes for the Wood Duck, spotted towhee, chickadee and flying squirrels.

We received instructions from Bob, a big guy with a heart of gold. A group of students who study Fish, Wildlife & Recreation at BCIT, a group of boy scouts attended the training as well. And Lucie, a girl who was on her own as well and with whom I got to chat with. For the boy scouts the first part of the instruction was a little tough, about the structure of regional parks in BC. I was hanging on every word Bob said because he was telling a lot about the local bird species and the history of BC. When a question was asked Bob couldn’t give a short answer, he told you everything there is to know about the subject. Eventually the nestboxes were brought out. We are supposed to remove all the nesting material of last year and put new wood shaving in. It is all part of the conservation of local birds so we have to make notes about everything we collect from the boxes. Which species used the box, are there any eggs left etc. The nestboxes are adjusted for the local birdspecies so no other birds will use the boxes. Because of the rain we only went out for a short time to view the nestboxes. Next week we will begin with the real work, I am ready!