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I met up with Ilana Block at the Technoparc early Wednesday morning. Within minutes we were observing a parade of birds.

“Those big white guys are great egrets,” said the Montreal photographer (who also happens to be my naturopath), describing what I would have called herons. “That little black-and-white guy is an eastern kingbird. They nest here.

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“There’s a black crowned night heron back there. He’s gorgeous with his breeding plumage; he has a beautiful long feather at the back of his head — stunning. There’s a green heron in there that might move as well. Sometimes you’ve just got to wait.”

And so we did.

We were rewarded with mallards, Canada geese flying out of the marsh and over our heads, a red-winged blackbird, northern flickers, green herons, a pied-billed grebe, tree swallows, song sparrows, a spotted sandpiper, ring-billed gulls, rock pigeons, yellow warblers, American robins and a gold finch. And this was apparently a quiet day — 185 species of birds have been spotted at the Technoparc in the last year.