When the Migrants are Away, the Residents Will Play

 CAPTAIN SAMS

The migrant switch turned off today as we only banded 12 birds. Thankfully, there were enough birds still hanging around the banding site that we had 34 recaptures too. Several of those recaptures were not migrants stopping over but resident birds which had been nearly absent during our recent busy stretch the last four days. Imagine hanging out in your house and you wake up the next morning to find hundreds of strangers milling around your home. In an anthropomorphic moment, I like to think that's how the resident birds feel the day after a cold front and all of these new birds are moving throughout their territories. Today, the signal was received that the "coast is clear", and they were free to move about normally...until the next cold front. 

-Aaron      

LITTLE BEAR

There were few migrants at Little Bear as well. To echo what Aaron pointed out, the only noises coming from the marsh as we opened nets were the chip notes of Northern Cardinals. And sure enough, we captured 2 today. We ended up with 22 new birds and 4 recaps, for a total of 26 birds of 10 species. Even though we've been off to a slower start this year, there is one species that has reached a new high record out at Little Bear...Blue-gray Gnatcatcher! The previous high total was 11 banded in 2022, and as of today we've banded 12. They should be around for the rest of the fall so we may even be able to add a few more to that number!

-Liz

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  (hatch year, unknown sex)

 

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Downy Woodpecker	-	4	-	-
White-eyed Vireo	2	5	1	-
Red-eyed Vireo	2	-	-	-
Carolina Chickadee	-	1	-	-
Carolina Wren	-	1	-	2
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher	-	-	2	-
Gray Catbird	1	6	3	1
Veery	1	-	-	-
Swainson's Thrush	-	-	1	-
Northern Waterthrush	-	1	2	-
Common Yellowthroat	5	11	8	-
American Redstart	-	1	3	-
Cape May Warbler	1	-	-	-
Northern Cardinal	-	3	1	1
Painted Bunting	-	1	1	-
	-	-	-	-

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	12	22	34
# of Recaptures	34	4	38
# of Species	13	10	15
Effort (net-hours)	189.75	126	315.75
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	24.2	20.6	22.8
# of Nets	33	28	-

2026 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	2,421	1,320	3,741
# of Recaptures	324	152	476
# of Species	54	56	68
Effort (net-hours)	6,777.0	4,403.9	11,180.9
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	40.5	33.4	37.7
# of Days	46	39

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Michael Gamble (CS)

Liz Held (LB)

Aiden Gifford (LB)

Amber Litterer (CS)

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.

FOS Saltmarsh Sparrow, Merlin, and Eastern Phoebe

 CAPTAIN SAMS

It was another decent day at Captain Sams with 57 new birds and 26 previously banded birds captured. It is warming up again and starting to slow down after our incredible weekend of bird migration. We did capture a first of season Saltmarsh Sparrow. This species winters in the saltmarshes on Kiawah and throughout the salt marshes along the Atlantic coast from southern New Jersey through the northern half of Florida . They are in rapid decline due to coastal development and sea level rise and without significant management intervention, could go extinct within the next few decades. 

Saltmarsh Sparrow (hatch year, unknown sex)

-Michael

LITTLE BEAR

Today at Little Bear we ended the day with 58 new birds and 17 recaps. With temps on the rise again we only banded for 4.5 hours, and I was super sweaty for the first time in a couple days. We had no luck in the pond net today... the peeps and herons might be onto us. Although we had no luck in the pond, we had another exciting visitor to our normal nets today, a good ol Merlin. These guys are smaller falcons, not much larger than Kestrels. Fun fact time! Merlins have been observed teaming up to hunt flocks of waxwings. One bird will attack from below and the other takes advantage of the confusion. They also don't build their own nests, and instead take over old raptor nests like a bunch of freeloaders. As with most raptors, the one today looked pretty flummoxed while we were banding it. Since the one we got today was pretty large, we determined it was a female after taking some measurements. Hopefully some more raptors get caught up in our nets! 

Merlin, hatch year, female

-Aiden 

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo	1	-	-	-
Merlin	-	-	1	-
Eastern Phoebe	-	-	1	-
White-eyed Vireo	1	2	1	-
Red-eyed Vireo	2	1	3	-
Carolina Chickadee	1	-	-	-
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher	-	-	1	-
Northern House Wren	1	-	-	1
Gray Catbird	12	6	8	3
Brown Thrasher	-	-	1	-
Swainson's Thrush	2	-	-	-
Saltmarsh Sparrow	1	-	-	-
Eastern Towhee	-	-	1	-
Yellow-breasted Chat	-	-	1	-
Ovenbird	1	2	1	-
Northern Waterthrush	2	-	1	1
Black-and-white Warbler	-	-	1	-
Common Yellowthroat	22	9	20	-
American Redstart	3	3	8	1
Northern Parula	1	1	-	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	2	-	-	-
Palm Warbler (Western)	1	-	2	-
Summer Tanager	1	-	-	-
Northern Cardinal	2	-	-	-
Painted Bunting	1	2	1	-

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	57	52	109
# of Recaptures	26	6	32
# of Species	18	17	25
Effort (net-hours)	171.2	126.0	297.2
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	48.5	46.0	47.4
# of Nets	33	28	61

2026 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	2136	1298	3434
# of Recaptures	266	148	414
# of Species	49	56	67
Effort (net-hours)	6585.8	4277.9	10863.7
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	36.5	33.8	35.4
# of Days	45	38

Banding Staff

Michael Gamble (CS)

Nancy Raginski (CS)

Liz Held (LB)

Olivia DeMarchi (LB)

Jasmine Fu (CS)

Baxter Shirley (CS)

Aiden Gifford (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.

In Pursuit of Peeps

 CAPTAIN SAMS

Things slowed down today at Captain Sam's. We ended the day with 126 newly banded and 23 recaptures. An interesting bird of the day was this leucistic Common Yellowthroat pictured below. Because of the bird's genetic condition, it is unable to deposit black and yellow pigment on the head feathers. This condition seemed not to affect the bird's survival, as it was aged an after hatch year (i.e. at least a year old) based on its completely ossified skull. We were able to call it a male too because he had a few black feathers on his face and a relatively long wing of 53.5 millimeters.

Common Yellowthroat (after hatch year, male)

– Jasmine

LITTLE BEAR

Today was a pretty chill day over at Little Bear. Our first net run had a good number of birds and we had a pretty steady calm pace for the rest of the morning, getting us up to 94 new birds and 8 recaps. We had our normal visitors today, with many Common Yellowthroats, American Redstarts, and Gray Catbirds. We also had a nice older male Painted Bunting showing off his nice colors. Towards the end of the day we decided to attempt a two man effort to flush some peeps into our new awesome, amazing, spectacular pond net. Olivia and I devised a plan and set our operation in motion. The first couple of attempts didn't go well, the peeps flew right under the net each time, seeing right through our ploy. After throwing our hats on the ground and our fists at the sky we attempted our last ditch effort to get these peeps in our net. This time we stalked and stalked from two new angles simultaneously, slowly pushing them right into our trap. As we thought they hit the right spot we rushed in and this time they hit the net. One bounced out but Olivia was quick enough to secure the other in her clutches, and we returned triumphantly, with the crowd cheering and confetti and balloons and other stuff like that we processed our Least Sandpiper friend and set it free to live in happiness.

-Aiden

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Least Sandpiper	-	-	1	-
Downy Woodpecker	-	1	-	-
Eastern Wood-Pewee	1	-	-	-
Acadian Flycatcher	-	-	1	-
White-eyed Vireo	-	1	-	-
Red-eyed Vireo	9	-	2	-
Carolina Chickadee	-	1	-	1
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher	1	-	2	-
Northern House Wren	5	-	1	-
Gray Catbird	34	7	20	2
Yellow-breasted Chat	2	-	-	-
Ovenbird	3	-	1	-
Northern Waterthrush	2	-	2	-
Common Yellowthroat	48	9	40	2
American Redstart	12	1	8	2
Northern Yellow Warbler	-	-	4	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	4	-	2	-
Western Palm Warbler	2	-	4	-
Prairie Warbler	-	-	1	-
Painted Bunting	3	1	4	1

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	126	94	220
# of Recaptures	23	8	31
# of Species	17	17	21
Effort (net-hours)	169.6	142.8	312.4
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	85.8	71.4	80.3
# of Nets	33	29	62

2026 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	2079	1246	3325
# of Recaptures	240	142	382
# of Species	48	54	64
Effort (net-hours)	6414.6	4151.9	10568.5
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	36.1	33.4	35.1
# of Days	44	37

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Michael Gamble (CS)

Liz Held (LB)

Olivia DeMarchi (LB)

Jasmine Fu (CS)

Aiden Gifford (LB)

Nancy Raginski (CS)

Baxter Shirey (CS)

David McLean (CS)

Ann McLean (CS)

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.

Feeling heron-tastic today!

 CAPTAIN SAMS

Birds are still moving through Kiawah Island in big numbers and it was another birdy day at Captain Sams with 336 newly banded birds and 25 recaptures. Species diversity was up from yesterday as we captured 32 different species today! Some highlights include several first of season birds: Yellow-throated Warbler, Hooded Warbler, Indigo Bunting, Scarlet Tanager, Eastern Wood-Pewee, and Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. We also caught the 6th Philadelphia Vireo ever captured at KIBS. The last one was captured 7 years ago, so it was very exciting to see this fella in a net. I was especially excited for the Yellow-throated Warbler as well because I'd never seen one in the hand. 

We send a big thank you to Ann and David McLean and Nancy Raginski for helping us out during the last few busy days. Volunteer help is huge in making processing large numbers of birds a smooth and efficient operation. Also thanks to Liz for the delicious cookies that powered us through net runs. 

Yellow-throated Warbler (after hatch year, male)

Philadelphia Vireo (hatch year, unknown sex)

-Olivia

LITTLE BEAR

We had slightly less volume today at Little Bear, but we still ended up with over 100 birds! We banded 114 new birds and had 7 recaps of 28 species. Despite the slight slow down, we had some really high-quality birds today, including a few more first of seasons. We caught our first Eastern Phoebe, first Wood Thrush and we had 4 Yellow-billed Cuckoos! Now that's cuckoo. Since it was a beautifully calm morning on the beach we decided to open the pond net and it did not disappoint. Returning from one of our net runs, I was surprised to see Aiden and Jasmine sitting at the table with a Tricolored Heron! As Aiden was going past the pond, he spied a couple of herons hanging out (probably feasting on the schools of fish now stranded in the pond). He expertly corralled them to move closer to the net and ran to secure one when it flew in. We determined this bird is a hatch year based on the plumage and eye color. The rusty patches on the head and throughout the back and wings indicate juvenile plumage vs uniform slate gray-blue in an adult. Young birds also have a light yellow eye compared to the orange or reddish eye of an adult. We took measurements of the bill and tarsus to determine that this is a male.

The recent large tides have flooded Little Bear and brought fish into the net lanes so our fingers are crossed for more herons in the near future.

-Liz

Tricolored Heron (hatch year, male) featuring Aiden (heron whisperer)

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo	1	-	4	-
Tricolored Heron	-	-	1	-
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker	1	-	-	-
Eastern Wood-pewee	1	-	1	-
Acadian Flycatcher	1	-	-	-
Traill's Flycatcher	2	-	-	-
Eastern Phoebe	-	-	1	-
White-eyed Vireo	3	2	5	-
Philadelphia Vireo	1	-	-	-
Red-eyed Vireo	13	-	1	-
Carolina Chickadee	-	-	-	1
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher	-	-	1	-
Northern House Wren	1	-	1	-
Carolina Wren	-	-	-	1
Gray Catbird	70	11	26	2
Brown Thrasher	-	-	2	-
Northern Mockingbird	1	-	-	-
Veery	1	-	2	-
Swainson's Thrush	7	-	1	-
Wood Thrush	-	-	1	-
Yellow-breasted Chat	-	-	1	-
Baltimore Oriole	1	-	-	-
Ovenbird	1	-	-	-
Northern Waterthrush	4	-	2	1
Black-and-White Warbler	4	-	1	-
Common Yellowthroat	170	8	40	-
Hooded Warbler	1	-	-	-
American Redstart	22	3	11	-
Cape May Warbler	1	-	-	-
Northern Parula	-	-	2	-
Magnolia Warbler	1	1	1	-
Northern Yellow Warbler	2	-	4	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	4	-	1	-
Western Palm Warbler	12	-	2	-
Pine Warbler	1	-	-	-
Yellow-throated Warbler	1	-	-	-
Prairie Warbler	2	-	-	-
Scarlet Tanager	1	-	-	-
Northern Cardinal	2	-	-	1
Indigo Bunting	1	-	1	-
Painted Bunting	2	-	1	1

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	336	114	450
# of Recaptures	25	7	32
# of Species	32	28	41
Effort (net-hours)	237.2	168	405.2
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	151.8	72	119
# of Nets	33	28	-

2026 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	1,935	1,152	3,087
# of Recaptures	237	136	373
# of Species	49	54	64
Effort (net-hours)	6,005.4	4,009.1	10,014.5
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	36.2	32.1	34.5
# of Days	43	36

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Michael Gamble (CS)

Liz Held (LB)

Olivia DeMarchi (CS)

Jasmine Fu (LB)

Aiden Gifford (LB)

Baxter Shirey (LB)

Nancy Raginski (CS)

David McLean (CS)

Ann McLean (CS)

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.

Record Breaking Day!

 CAPTAIN SAMS

It was a record breaking day at Captain Sam's with 495 new birds banded and 6 recaptures! We thought this weekend would be huge since this is the first real cold front of the season and because of the lack of birds earlier in the season due to the heat and lack of cold fronts. This included 225 Common Yellowthroats, which made up 45% of our total captures. Gray Catbirds are also moving in with Common Yellowthroats and they came in second with 87 captured. At third were 84 American Redstarts, the most we have captured in a single morning. The highlights were a first of season Northern Flicker, Eastern Wood Pewee, and Blackburnian Warbler, and an adult male Summer Tanager. 

Birds hanging up from our first net run

Blackburnian Warbler (hatch year, male)

        
                                                                            

Summer Tanager (after hatch year, male)

-Michael

LITTLE BEAR

We had another great day out at Little Bear! Volume wise it was really similar to yesterday with 198 new birds and 5 recaptures, but much higher diversity with 28 species captured today (yesterday we had 19). Interestingly, Common Yellowthroats only made up 30% of birds banded today, quite the difference from yesterday. Catbirds came in to fill those numbers, and we also saw a small boost in vireo species and other warbler species like American Redstarts and Black-throated Blue. We also captured several first of season birds today including Swainson's Thrush, Gray-cheeked Thrush, Hooded Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, and Rose-breasted Grosbeak. 

A few other highlights from today were a Baltimore Oriole, Yellow-billed Cuckoo, and a recaptured Gray Catbird that was originally banded in 2022! It's interesting how much things can change in one day out at Little Bear, so I'm excited to see what's in store for tomorrow!

-Liz

Black-throated Green Warbler (Hatch year, male)

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo	2	-	1	-
Norther Flicker	1	-	-	-
Eastern Wood Pewee	1	-	-	-
Traill's Flycatcher	3	-	-	-
Acadian Flycatcher	-	-	1	-
White-eyed Vireo	10	-	8	-
Red-eyed Vireo	16	-	13	-
Northern House Wren	4	-	3	-
Carolina Wren	-	-	-	1
Carolina Chickadee	-	2	-	-
Gray Catbird	87	-	49	1
Northern Mockingbird	1	-	1	-
Veery	-	-	1	-
Gray-cheeked Thrush	-	-	1	-
Swainson's Thrush	8	-	1	-
Yellow-breasted Chat	-	-	2	-
Baltimore Oriole	-	-	1	-
Ovenbird	2	1	-	-
Northern Waterthrush	4	-	2	-
Black-and-white Warbler	6	-	-	-
Common Yellowthroat	225	2	52	1
Hooded Warbler	-	-	1	-
American Redstart	84	-	32	-
Cape May Warbler	-	-	3	-
Northern Parula	3	-	1	-
Magnolia Warbler	7	-	1	-
Blackburnian Warbler	1	-	-	-
Northern Yellow Warbler	2	-	2	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	10	-	10	-
Palm Warbler (Western)	13	-	8	-
Prairie Warbler	3	-	1	-
Black-throated Green Warbler	-	-	1	-
Rose-breasted Grosbeak	-	-	1	-
Summer Tanager	1	-	-	-
Indigo Bunting	-	-	1	-
Painted Bunting	1	1	-	2

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	495	198	693
# of Recaptures	6	5	11
# of Species	25	28	36
Effort (net-hours)	267.3	196.0	463.3
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	187.4	103.6	152.0
# of Nets	33	28	61

2026 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	1599	1037	2636
# of Recaptures	212	132	344
# of Species	43	49	59
Effort (net-hours)	5768.2	3841.1	9609.3
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	31.4	30.4	31.0
# of Days	42	35

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Michael Gamble (CS)

Liz Held (LB)

Olivia DeMarchi (CS)

Jasmine Fu (LB)

Aiden Gifford (LB)

Jen Tyrell (CS)

Ann McLean (CS)

Nancy Raginski (CS)

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.