The Howland Winter Wren Page

Page by Royce

The Winter Wren (Troglodytes troglodytes) appears to be a fairly rare beastie for the Calgary region. Indeed, it is rare enough and the photos below are questionable enough that I'm not 100% positive of the identification. However, the other types of Wren around Calgary (House, Sedge, Marsh, etc.) match the observed individual and its habitat even less.

Resources where you can find out more:

• Winter Wren profile at CLO including sound sample

Able to leap branches in a single bound!

I spotted the Wren in question in the Votier's Flats area of Fish Creek Provincial Park on August 3, 2002. The sighting was of a tiny, compact, active bird of rich brown coloring, with barring a lot more visible than is evident from these lousy photos. It was incredibly secretive and hard to spot even though I could hear it and see that something active was moving around in the bush. Once I caught a glimpse of the bird amongst the lower leaves of the shrubs bordering the marshy pond just at the start of the lower trail at Votier's Flats, I persisted until I was able to get a few mediocre shots. The picture quality is probably suffering at least in part because I was shooting at ISO 800 equivalent, trying to get the shutter speed up faster to catch the little devil in the shady interior of the brush. Once we got back home, we looked at the photos for a long time while poring over Sibley, Peterson, Stokes and more, plus our CLO Guide to Birds of North America software. The short, cocked tail, dark coloring, tiny, compact size, short, straight bill, buff eye-stripe, plus the habitat where the bird was seen, finally convinced us to go with the Winter Wren ID. Photo info: 320 x 457 true color Exposure time: 10/2641 F-stop: 5.9 ISO speed: 800 Focal length: 71.2000 (plus 1.5X teleconverter) Exposure bias: 0.0000 Metering mode: Pattern Exposure program: Normal Compression: 6 Camera make: NIKON Camera model: E5700

Who dat?

Another quick look at the Winter Wren from August 3, 2002. Photo info: 320 x 270 true color Exposure time: 10/3403 F-stop: 5.9 ISO speed: 800 Focal length: 71.2000 (plus 1.5X teleconverter) Exposure bias: 0.0000 Metering mode: Pattern Exposure program: Normal Compression: 6 Camera make: NIKON Camera model: E5700

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