Captain Sams:
Predictions for another busy morning were proven true quite quickly today! The cold front moved in handily overnight, greeting us with a cool 55.8 degrees as we made our way into the banding station. We had fewer banded birds today at 190 but had a record number of 31 recaptures to pad our total a little bit. Together that puts us at 221 total processed birds, just 13 birds higher than yesterday!
We captured a couple warblers not yet seen at Captain Sam's this year: Myrtle Warbler and Yellow-throated Warbler. Today also brought with it a second Tennessee Warbler, an after-hatch-year female!
Our most exciting species of the day was from a family of feisty birds that we capture quite often. Amongst the sea of White-eyed and Red-eyed Vireos that usually come through each day, today brought with it a vireo named after a part of its' body of a different color; Blue-headed Vireo!
The individual was a hatch-year bird, yet still sported a very clean set of white spectacles, and a sharply crisp blue head. A fun fact about this Vireo species is that at one point it was called by a different name; Solitary Vireo. This species' name was shared amongst birds in all parts of the continent, but genetic studies determined three distinct species under the Solitary Vireo umbrella. Henceforth, the species was split three ways: Blue-headed Vireo became a new species in the East; Plumbeous Vireo and Cassin's Vireo became two new species in the West.
-Matt
Little Bear:
Today was a fantastic day! We ended up with a total of 231 birds! Out of those birds, only 11 of them were recaptures. We started out the day being a little chilly and thinking it was a gonna be an easy day but we were absolutely wrong. Our most abundant species for the day was the Palm Warbler (western subspecies) breaking almost 100 of them! We joked and talked about having another crazy Cuckoo day and took a guess on what we would catch. We were lucky to have captured 2 of them! only one of them was previously banded yesterday.
There were a few first of the season birds today, like our first of the season Wood Thrush. I was surprise to see this bird during our busy time. After a quick photo, this cutie was released to go on their marry little way.
Another species that was captured was a Nashville Warbler. This was a fun one to have since this was a first for everyone at the station to see in the hand. It was nice to point out the key characteristics that point to a Nashville Warbler.
Our 3rd species to gloat about was catch a Blue Jay. It has been awhile since we last caught our Blue Jay in 2019. It is always a treat to have them in the hand, because they are a completely different kind of individual that you see when observing freely flying around. This cutie was so calm in the hand and was such a lovely individual to handle.
Our last special bird to have captured at the station was the Black-throated Green Warbler. It has been a good 5 years since I last seen one of these birds in the hand, so it was definitely an exciting thing to have finally catch one here at little bear! This is Little Bears 3rd Black-throated Green Warbler, one banded in 2015 and 2017.
I am pretty excited to see what tomorrow will have in store for us and hopefully still new species but also just seeing all the birds is just a treat overall.
-Kristin
| Species | Captain Sams | Little Bear | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New | Recaps | New | Recaps | |
Yellow-billed Cuckoo | 2 | - | 1 | 1 |
Downy Woodpecker | - | 1 | - | - |
Traill's Flycatcher | - | - | 1 | - |
Eastern Phoebe | 13 | - | 2 | - |
White-eyed Vireo | 3 | 2 | 3 | - |
Blue-headed Vireo | 1 | - | - | - |
Red-eyed Vireo | 2 | - | 1 | - |
Blue Jay | - | - | 1 | - |
Carolina Chickadee | - | - | - | 1 |
Ruby-crowned Kinglet | 9 | 1 | 4 | - |
House Wren | 7 | 1 | 3 | - |
Gray Catbird | 45 | 22 | 43 | 7 |
Brown Thrasher | - | 1 | 3 | - |
Gray-cheeked Thrush | 1 | - | - | - |
Swainson's Thrush | 9 | - | 3 | - |
Wood Thrush | 1 | - | 1 | - |
Ovenbird | 2 | 1 | - | - |
Northern Waterthrush | 1 | - | 1 | - |
Black-and-white Warbler | 6 | - | 2 | - |
Tennessee Warbler | 1 | - | - | - |
Nashville Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
Common Yellowthroat | 17 | - | 21 | - |
Hooded Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
American Redstart | 16 | 1 | 9 | 1 |
Cape May Warbler | 2 | - | 1 | - |
Northern Parula | 7 | 1 | 3 | - |
Magnolia Warbler | 2 | - | - | - |
Chestnut-sided Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
Black-throated Blue Warbler | 4 | - | 3 | - |
Palm Warbler (western subspecies) | 30 | - | 98 | - |
Myrtle Warbler | 1 | - | 2 | - |
Yellow-throated Warbler | 1 | - | - | - |
Black-throated Green Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
Summer Tanager | 1 | - | - | - |
Northern Cardinal | - | - | 1 | - |
Indigo Bunting | 5 | - | 5 | - |
Painted Bunting | 1 | - | 4 | 1 |
| Today's Banding Stats | Captain Sams | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded | 190 | 220 | 410 |
| # of Recaptures | 31 | 11 | 42 |
| # of Species | 29 | 29 | 37 |
| Effort (net-hours) | 220.8 | 173.3 | 394.1 |
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) | 100.1 | 133.3 | 114.7 |
| # of Nets | 32 | 25 | 57 |
| 2023 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats | Captain Sams | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded | 2575 | 1,807 | 4,382 |
| # of Recaptures | 579 | 264 | 843 |
| # of Species | 60 | 67 | 76 |
| Effort (net-hours) | 8664.95 | 5,118.8 | 12,524.55 |
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) | 36.4 | 40.5 | 41.7 |
| # of Days | 53 | 43 | - |
Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)Aiden Given (CS)
