Two Rare Thrushes - Townsend's Solitaire and Mountain Bluebird

It has been a good couple of weeks for rare thrushes in Ontario with a Townsend's Solitaire in Dufferin County found by Dan MacNeal and a Mountain Bluebird near Waterloo found a few days later by Anthony Vandeheyden.  I was lucky enough to see both of these birds, although both took two tries.

Unfortunately, the solitaire stayed sitting in a tangle of branches, so no great photos.  You can see the grapes it was feeding on in the foreground.

Townsend's Solitaire

The Mountain Bluebird posed another problem, by sitting at the top of a tree in plain sight against an overcast sky, the backlighting was terrible.  This is a female bird, so it is very grey with a bluish tail and some blue on the wings.

Mountain Bluebird

I also had a Northern Shrike at the same location on my first try for the bird.