Last Tremblant trip of the year, maybe…

This Saturday was forecast to be the best of the two weekend days weather wise and so we went off to Parc Recreation de Mont Tremblant, a couple of hours north of Montreal.

We had intended to explore areas we have yet to visit, its a big place after all, but we ended up doing our favourite spots before very heavy rain curtailed activity. We started off on the Atocas Trail about 2km after the Visitor Center, the target being Black Meadowhawk. A few were at the regular spot, off the second viewing platformm, but they were not settled, being constantly harried by a variety of darners.

Moving on we picked our to the Barrage du Lac Escalier for lunch and, as it happened a very vocal and showy Black-backed Woodpecker, showy if you had a scope that is, we did. Odes were few and far between here so we took the lane to Lac Rossi. Here we take a small lane to a quiet car park with usually active lake and stream. We were not disppointed finding numerous Spotted Spreadwings, Cherry-faced, Banded and White-faced Meadowhawks, American Emeralds and a couple of emerald species that would not cme close enough for photos. Canada Darners were super common but we also had Black-tipped and Shadow Darner. Eventually a cartwheeling pair of darners pitched down onto a rotting stump. He was off smartish but she stayed to lay eggs and pose, the first Variable Darner I’ve managed to photograph.

Add a few butterflies to the mix, Pearl-spotted Fritillary, White Admiral and Monarch’s and it was a good trip. We stopped off on the way home to see the Ospreys near Pine Hill, four birds were present so presumably their young were out of the nest, they were a bit distant to age.

Below a set of photos starting with the Variable Darner. The photos  were taken with a mixture of the Canon with 100-400X, the Panasonic and the Nikon P6000.