2012 Fall Migration Banding Results

The 2012 fall migration banding season at the Kiawah Island Banding Station (KIBS) is complete!  Nets were opened for a total of 98 days (out of a possible 108) from August 15 - November 30th.  We lost 5 consecutive days due to high winds and rain from Hurricane Sandy (October 27-31) with the other 5 scattered across the season. 

We banded 4,725 new birds and had 885 recaptures of 89 different species.  The most commonly banded species were Common Yellowthroats (1339), Yellow-rumped Warbler (1060), and Gray Catbird (610).  Those three species combined made up 64% of all the birds banded this season!     

 

We banded 18 species never before banded at KIBS: Virginia Rail, Philadelphia Vireo, Tree Swallow, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Brown Creeper, Winter Wren, Nashville Warbler, Swainson's Warbler, Louisiana Waterthrush, Kentucky Warbler, Wilson's Warbler, Canada Warbler, Chipping Sparrow, Clay-colored Sparrow, Vesper Sparrow, Nelson's Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow, and Dark-eyed Junco.

 

We increased our effort three-fold from 2409.8 net-hours in 2011 to 7220.6 net-hours this year.  This increase in effort was a result of two factors:  (1) we increased the number nets we used from 12 to 17, and (2) we banded every day (weather depending).      

 

We also had lots of returning birds that were banded in previous seasons.  It will take a little while to sort through all those records to determine exactly how many unique returns we actually had as I suspect there will be several that were captured more than one time during the fall. 

The following is a photographic recap of some of the highlights from this season:

Virginia Rail

Chuck-Will's-Widow

Philadelphia Vireo



Bell's Vireo




Red-breasted Nuthatch




Brown Creeper




Winter Wren




Chestnut-sided Warbler



Swainson's Warbler

Louisiana Waterthrush (very late bird banded on September 1, 2012)

Kentucky Warbler



Wilson's Warbler




Canada Warbler




Chipping Sparrow



Clay-colored Sparrow




Vesper Sparrow




Nelson's Sparrow




White-crowned Sparrow




Dark-eyed Junco




2012 FALL SEASON TOTALS

*Numbers in parentheses indicate the # of recaptures       

HAWKS

Sharp-shinned Hawk 7 (2)

 

RAILS

Virginia Rail 1

 

DOVES

Mourning Dove 5

Common Ground-Dove 13 (10)

 

NIGHTJARS

Chuck-Will's-Widow 1

 

WOODPECKERS

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 4 (2)

Downy Woodpecker 7 (11)

 

FLYCATCHERS

Eastern Wood-Pewee 3

Acadian Flycatcher 3

Traill's Flycatcher 23 (1)

Least Flycatcher 2

Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 1

Eastern Phoebe 29

Great Crested Flycatcher 3

 

VIREOS

Philadelphia Vireo 1

White-eyed Vireo 35 (17)

Bell's Vireo 1

Blue-headed Vireo 2

Red-eyed Vireo 110 (2)

 

CORVIDS

Blue Jay (1)

 

SWALLOWS

Tree Swallow 4

 

CHICKADEES, NUTHATCHES, and CREEPERS

Carolina Chickadee 15 (68)

Red-breasted Nuthatch 5 (3)

Brown Creeper 1

 

WRENS

Carolina Wren 7 (22)

House Wren 48 (23)

Winter Wren 2 (1)

Marsh Wren 3 - including 1 Worthington's

 

KINGLETS and GNATCATCHERS

Golden-crowned Kinglet 10 (1)

Ruby-crowned Kinglet 60 (13)

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher 4

 

THRUSHES

Veery 15

Gray-cheeked Thrush 2

Swainson's Thrush 25

Hermit Thrush 31 (14)

Wood Thrush 1

American Robin 6

 

MIMIDS

Gray Catbird 610 (239)

Northern Mockingbird 26 (19)

Brown Thrasher 6 (11)

 

WOOD WARBLERS

Tennessee Warbler 1

Orange-crowned Warbler 11 (13)

Nashville Warbler 2

Northern Parula 28

Yellow Warbler 36 (1)

Chestnut-sided Warbler 1

Magnolia Warbler 14

Cape May Warbler 12 (1)

Black-throated Blue Warbler 93 (4)

Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle) 1060 (148)

Pine Warbler 1

Prairie Warbler 164 (16)

Palm Warbler 163 (1) - "Western" (158), "Yellow" (5)

Blackpoll Warbler 5

Worm-eating Warbler 5

Prothonotary Warbler 4

Black-and-White Warbler 20 (1)

American Redstart 165 (14)

Swainson's Warbler 1

Ovenbird 13 (9)

Northern Waterthrush 101 (13)

Louisiana Waterthrush 1

Kentucky Warbler 1

Common Yellowthroat 1339 (60)

Hooded Warbler 4 (3)

Wilson's Warbler 2

Canada Warbler 1

Yellow-breasted Chat 4 (1)

 

SPARROWS

Eastern Towhee 15 (13)

Chipping Sparrow 2

Clay-colored Sparrow 5

Field Sparrow 3

Vesper Sparrow 1

Savannah Sparrow (1)

Nelson's Sparrow 1

Song Sparrow 54 (7)

Swamp Sparrow 66 (11)

White-throated Sparrow 11 (4)

White-crowned Sparrow 1

Dark-eyed Junco 1

 

CARDINALS and BUNTINGS

Summer Tanager 2 (1)

Scarlet Tanager 1

Northern Cardinal 37 (64)

Blue Grosbeak 3

Indigo Bunting 48 (2)

Painted Bunting 71 (46)

 

BLACKBIRDS

Baltimore Oriole 4

 

FINCHES

House Finch 10

American Goldfinch 5

BANDING STATS

# of Birds Banded:  4,725

# of Recaptures:  885

# of Species:  89

Effort:  7220.6 net-hours

Capture Rate:  77.6 birds/100 net-hours

# of Days Banded:  98

I would like to thank all those that made this season such a great success:  my banding assistants (William Oakley, Meghan Oberkircher, DeeAnne Meliopoulos, and Michael Novak); the Kiawah Island Conservancy for providing funding for mist nets, banding equipment, and the hiring of 3 banding assistants; the Town of Kiawah Island for allowing me to take on an extremely time consuming project; Kiawah Development Partners for allowing access to their property; and finally to all the volunteers that donated their time to either come out and help or just to observe.