CAPTAIN SAMS
Not much migration happening right now along the east coast due to the southwest winds. As a result, we only banded 18 new birds and had 9 recaptures today. A majority of the birds captured were Yellow-rumped Warblers. This will be a common theme for the remainder of the fall migration banding season. We are still waiting for the large numbers of Yellow-rumps to show. It looks like that might happen sometime next week.
Southwest winds will continue over night and into tomorrow morning until big changes come our way Sunday night as a strong cold front pushes through our area. We we be looking at temperature in the mid 30's on Monday night with winds between 10-12 mph.
-Aaron
LITTLE BEAR
It was another slow day at Little Bear with 14 newly banded birds and 14 recaps of 10 species. We had a mix of the usual late-fall species like Gray Catbirds, Swamp Sparrows, a White-throated Sparrow, and Yellow-rumped Warblers. We also caught a Cape May Warbler today, which was a nice little surprise. She was in the net right next to a young female yellow-rumped so perhaps they were foraging together.
Our other notable capture today was a White Ibis! On a few occasions we have seen small flocks of Ibis foraging in the marshy clearing in the middle of the nets. I even flushed a few into a net a couple of days ago, but they were able to escape. Today, I watched three young White Ibis forage in the water right under one of the nets for about 10 minutes until they got spooked and took flight. One of them happened to get stuck in a pocket and since I was close by I was able to contain it before it could escape!
Even though White Ibis are very common on the island, it was a really great experience to both watch them forage from only a few yards away and to get a closer look at their features in the hand.
-Liz
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| (All images) White Ibis, Hatch-year male |
| Species | Captain Sams | Little Bear | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New | Recaps | New | Recaps | |
White Ibis | - | - | 1 | - |
Ruby-crowned Kinglet | 1 | - | - | - |
Carolina Chickadee | - | 1 | - | - |
Carolina Wren | - | - | - | 1 |
Gray Catbird | - | 4 | 3 | 9 |
Hermit Thrush | - | 2 | 1 | - |
White-throated Sparrow | - | - | 1 | - |
Song Sparrow | 1 | - | - | - |
Swamp Sparrow | - | - | 2 | - |
Cape May Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
Western Palm Warbler | - | - | 1 | - |
Myrtle Warbler | 16 | 2 | 4 | - |
Northern Cardinal | - | - | - | 3 |
| - | - | - | - | |
| Today's Banding Stats | Captain Sams | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded | 18 | 14 | 32 |
| # of Recaptures | 9 | 14 | 23 |
| # of Species | 6 | 10 | 13 |
| Effort (net-hours) | 173.2 | 154 | 327.2 |
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) | 15.6 | 17.5 | 16.8 |
| # of Nets | 32 | 28 | - |
| 2025 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats | Captain Sams | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded | 4,982 | 3,414 | 8,396 |
| # of Recaptures | 1,055 | 945 | 2,000 |
| # of Species | 91 | 91 | 105 |
| Effort (net-hours) | 13,104.3 | 9,459.1 | 22,563.4 |
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) | 46.1 | 46.1 | 46.1 |
| # of Days | 82 | 71 |
Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)Liz Held (LB)
Camille Beckwith (LB)
Note: All banding, marking, and sampling is being conducted under a federally authorized Bird Banding Permit issued by the U.S. Geological Survey’s Bird Banding Lab.
