Grab your binoculars and try to spot the beautiful birds of Bruce County

Thousands of birds and an amazing variety of species bring bird enthusiasts to the area with binoculars ready to spot and cameras ready to photograph these little beauties.

Feed chickadees from the palm of your hand.

All year long, there’s always birding opportunities – whether you’re at Inverhuron Provincial Park, Baie du Dore where bald eagles congregate in the winter, or checking out the Parks Canada Lookout Tower where you can see migrating raptors in May. Our sprawling Lake Huron and Georgian Bay coastlines give birders and photographers unique opportunities to discover nature. While the bird numbers vary from year to year, there’s one thing that’s guaranteed, if you bring bird seed, our chickadee’s will find you and enjoy a snack right from the palm of your hand.

Birders Assemble

Each spring, MacGregor Point Provincial Park hosts the annual Huron Fringe Birding Festival. Join them for eight days of guided hikes, bird identification workshops and nature photography. It is an incredible celebration of biodiversity, nature and learning! This event doesn’t just stay at the provincial park, but takes you on birding adventures all around the area – from Kincardine to Paisley and all the way up to the Niagara Escarpment on a variety of trips with varying difficulty.

Regular boat tours leave the Oliphant docks filled with birders and sometimes even an expert speaker. Check out Bruce Peninsula Boat Tours for the list of upcoming events such as birding with Doug Powell, birding photography, and more! These tours take you around the 70+ Fishing Islands which are primed and ready with countless birds.

Christmas bird counts always bring out to birding enthusiasts, these events take place all over the County, including MacGregor Point Provincial Park, Walkerton, Neyaashiinigmiing (Cape Croker), Wiarton, Tobermory, and Saugeen Shores.

Year-Round Birding in Bruce County

Bruce County offers plenty of excellent birding opportunities year-round, some of the local hotspots include:
Chantry Island, just off the shore of Southampton, plays host to a large number of nesting waterbirds
Black Creek Provincial Park on the Bruce Peninsula, is a unique northern micro-habitat that draws many migrants, and hosts some rare breeders

Stokes Bay on the Bruce Peninsula is also one of the County’s best spots to find migrating shorebirds and ducks

Baie du Dore next to Bruce Power has a mixed habitat that attracts a great diversity of birds – including Bald Eagles in winter

Dyer’s Bay to Cabot Head is Ontario’s primier staging area for Red-necked Grebes in the spring
Bruce Peninsula National Park, here you’ll find a mixture of birds including Loons

Inverhuron Provincial Park‘s mostly an evergreen forest so you’ll see lots of nesting Canada Warblers and Redstarts here

Isaac Lake you’ll be able to see nesting marsh birds like the Sandhill Crane

Kincardine Lagoons are the local hotspot for rare birds, such as the Summer Tanager, Ross’s Goose and Eurasian Wigeon

For more outdoor activities, visit: Outdoor Activities on the Bruce.