Captain Sam's
We had a pretty good morning out at Captain Sam's with 28 new birds and 22 recaptures of 11 species. This was a little bit of a switch up from the very slow days we've been having at the spit. We were relieved to get a few more birds today since the Seabrook Island Natural History Group visited the banding station. We had plenty of birds of different species to show, including one of our highlights, an adult male Northern Flicker. We don't catch many of these so it's always a surprise to get one in the net! Later in the morning, we caught our fourth Cooper's Hawk of the season whereas we only caught one all of last season. This was the first Cooper's Hawk and largest raptor I've banded!
We also had many recaptures that were banded in previous years. The most interesting is a Yellow-rumped Warbler I processed today, which was banded in 2011. It was also recaught in 2012, 2013, and 2015. Coincidentally, I processed this same Yellow-rumped Warbler last year as well. We also caught a Yellow-rumped Warbler banded in 2013 and another banded in 2014. Another interesting recapture was a Northern Cardinal, which was banded in 2011 and has been recaptured at least twice every year since. It's always exciting to see birds return to KIBS year after year!
-Michael Gamble
We had a pretty good morning out at Captain Sam's with 28 new birds and 22 recaptures of 11 species. This was a little bit of a switch up from the very slow days we've been having at the spit. We were relieved to get a few more birds today since the Seabrook Island Natural History Group visited the banding station. We had plenty of birds of different species to show, including one of our highlights, an adult male Northern Flicker. We don't catch many of these so it's always a surprise to get one in the net! Later in the morning, we caught our fourth Cooper's Hawk of the season whereas we only caught one all of last season. This was the first Cooper's Hawk and largest raptor I've banded!
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| Cooper's Hawk (hatch-year, male) The yellow eye is an indication of a hatch-year bird whereas second year birds will have an orange eye and after second year birds will have a reddish eye. |
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| Cooper's Hawk (hatch-year, male) Hatch-years will also have brown feathers with buffy edging on upperparts and brown streaking on underparts. Adults will have blue-gray on upperparts and reddish barring on underparts. |
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| Cooper's Hawk (second year, female) This is a good example of an adult Cooper's Hawk banded on October 25th. You can see the gray on the back, reddish barring on the breast, and orange eye. |
We also had many recaptures that were banded in previous years. The most interesting is a Yellow-rumped Warbler I processed today, which was banded in 2011. It was also recaught in 2012, 2013, and 2015. Coincidentally, I processed this same Yellow-rumped Warbler last year as well. We also caught a Yellow-rumped Warbler banded in 2013 and another banded in 2014. Another interesting recapture was a Northern Cardinal, which was banded in 2011 and has been recaptured at least twice every year since. It's always exciting to see birds return to KIBS year after year!
-Michael Gamble
Little Bear
Compared to yesterday, at Little Bear today we had much less wind and almost 5 times as many birds. Although our total of 27 new and 22 recaptures is fairly slow overall, it was a welcome change from the low numbers we had yesterday. We did have some excitement in the form of catching a male Sharp-shinned Hawk for the second day in a row, which makes this the first time all season that both sites have caught a hawk on the same day.
Sharp-shinned Hawks are one of the most commonly captured raptors in banding projects like this, in part because their small size prevents them from bouncing out of nets the way larger hawks do, and in part because they hunt small songbirds by rapidly pursuing them through thick vegetation (such as where we put our nets). Now that we're moving into the latter part of fall migration the hatch-year Sharp-shins are becoming more common, and we may get a few more of them in the coming week and a half.
--Blaine
Sharp-shinned Hawks are one of the most commonly captured raptors in banding projects like this, in part because their small size prevents them from bouncing out of nets the way larger hawks do, and in part because they hunt small songbirds by rapidly pursuing them through thick vegetation (such as where we put our nets). Now that we're moving into the latter part of fall migration the hatch-year Sharp-shins are becoming more common, and we may get a few more of them in the coming week and a half.
--Blaine
| Species | Captain Sam's | Little Bear | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New | Recaps | New | Recaps | |
Sharp-shinned Hawk
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
Cooper's Hawk
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
Northern Flicker
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
Carolina Chickadee
|
-
|
3
|
-
|
-
|
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
|
4
|
1
|
2
|
1
|
Hermit Thrush
|
-
|
1
|
1
|
-
|
Gray Catbird
|
4
|
3
|
2
|
10
|
Brown Thrasher
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
Northern Mockingbird
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
2
|
Orange-crowned Warbler
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle)
|
13
|
8
|
17
|
6
|
Eastern Towhee
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
Song Sparrow
|
1
|
2
|
1
|
-
|
Swamp Sparrow
|
4
|
2
|
1
|
-
|
Northern Cardinal
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
2
|
Painted Bunting
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
| Banding Stats | Captain Sam's | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded |
28
|
27
|
55
|
| # of Recaptures |
22
|
22
|
44
|
| # of Species |
11
|
12
|
16
|
| Effort (net-hours) |
140.4
|
120.0
|
260.4
|
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) |
35.6
|
40.8
|
38.0
|
| # of Nets |
26
|
20
|
46
|
Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)
Blaine Carnes (LB)
Mattie VandenBoom (CS)
Alison Nevins (LB)
Col Lauzau (LB)
Michael Gamble (CS)
Michael Rodgers (LB)
Ryan Donnelly (CS)
Nancy Raginski (CS)
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