City data suggests 'stark decline' of waterfowl on Toronto beaches during summer, expert says

This story is a collaboration between CBC Toronto and the Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF).

A new analysis of city data suggests a dramatic decline in birds on Toronto beaches over the past two decades.

The public dataset shows 73 per cent fewer waterfowl counted on Toronto's beaches from 2008 to 2024, indicating its waterfronts have become less hospitable to the animals, according to experts, but also that the city's efforts to keep birds away from the beaches are working.

The 11,488 counts were conducted by lifeguards, rather than scientists, and don't constitute a scientific survey, but make up one of the most widespread accounts of conditions for waterfowl in Toronto in the summer months, according to an expert who reviewed the data.

The counts were completed at 10 Toronto beaches during the summer months during the 17-year span. According to the data, lifeguards counted an average of 51 waterfowl per count across all beaches in 2008, compared with 14 in 2024. The most affected beaches include Sunnyside Beach, which went from an average of 100 waterfowl counted in 2008 to 17 in 2024, and Centre Island Beach, which went from 92 in 2008 to 15 in 2024.

A spokesperson for Toronto Public Health said the reduction in birds was expected as the city has been trying to discourage their presence when the beaches are open for swimming, to minimize droppings. This involves corralling and relocating birds, enacting bylaws against the feeding of waterfowl and the use of dogs to drive them away.

Fewer birds mean fewer droppings and less chance of E. coli in beach waters. But one expert says the data raises important questions about wildlife habitat and whether the reduced presence of birds on beaches means they're making homes elsewhere or if their population might be declining due to human activity.

According to Marc Cadotte, a biology professor at the University of Toronto Scarborough who has independently reviewed the data, the counts show a "stark decline" in the number of birds on waterfronts.

If the city's deterrents are successful, Cadotte wonders whether they result in a loss of habitat for the birds.

"Are they moving to other places in the city, or do these deterrents impact populations in the long-term? Wild animals consistently lose habitat with urbanization, and if we further drive them out of usable habitat, we are magnifying our impacts," he said.

"This is more of a case of classic human-wildlife conflict, and the usual outcome is that wildlife lose."

Asked about the possibility of population decline, Mahesh Patel, manager of health protection at Toronto Public Health said measuring the number of birds in an area can be challenging given their constant movement and that the data should be taken as a snapshot in time.

The city did not respond to questions about the possible environmental impact of its measure on bird populations overall.

The population of the Greater Toronto Area rose from 5,530,588 in 2008 to 7,106,379 in 2024, according to Statistics Canada.

"Cities are where we get multiple stressors together with humans, and so we kind of get a picture of what's going to happen in the future elsewhere," Cadotte said.

Toronto Public Health says the data shouldn't be used to estimate the presence of waterfowl in Toronto generally.

"Although the daily counts in the beach observation data are a rough estimate, the data collected are helpful to have as we know that a higher number of waterfowl may negatively impact water quality due to a potentially higher number of droppings," TPH said in an email.

Toronto and Region Conservation Authority spokesperson Afiya Jilani said that some of the waterfowl population is impacted by city staff intentionally relocating geese away from humans and that it's hard to make conclusions about conditions for waterfowl overall.

"While there may be fewer waterfowl observed on Toronto beaches, this could reflect improved habitat conditions elsewhere in the region," she wrote.

Mark Peck, manager of the Schad Gallery of Biodiversity at the Royal Ontario Museum, said he is "heavily concerned" about relying on this specific dataset to understand bird population levels due to unknowns in the methodology, such as lifeguards having varying levels of aptitude or motivation to conduct the counts.

He said other research points to Toronto still being a good place for waterfowl to migrate through during the winter and that counting them on beaches during the summer is not a good indicator of how they are doing.

"The areas where there's going to be lifeguards probably aren't the best areas for waterfowl in Toronto anyway," Peck said.

For Haroop Sandhu, a student living in Toronto and frequenter of Woodbine and Centre Island beaches, watching ducks is a main reason she goes to beaches.

"I love wildlife, it's one of the most important parts of being at the beach," she said. "I feel like if [human activity] is the main reason then we can't really do anything about it because people are going to go to the beach, so it's a side-effect, but it's a sad side-effect."

Bird watcher Vivian Li, who favours Sunnyside Beach, shared the same sentiment. "It's their home as well, and we need to share the space with them instead of chasing them off," she said.

Cadotte says despite limitations to the data, it is still useful for describing conditions on beaches.

"I would say that this type of data more than surpasses any questionable limits on the minimum amount of data. So I think that in terms of the number of observations, it's actually quite robust given comparable data sets," he said.

Whether it shows birds merely spending time in other places or broader population issues, Cadotte said: "There's no scenario in which this would be a good thing."