Monday, October 24, 2016

October 24, 2016

Captain Sam's
It was a lot slower out at Captain Sam's this morning with 38 new birds and 16 recaptures of 17 species. We caught another Brown Creeper, making that 5 caught in the last 3 days after only catching one in all previous years at KIBS. We also caught another Red-winged Blackbird today, making that the second one of the season and ever banded at KIBS. It was also the first one I've ever banded. I caught many when I was banding and doing marsh sparrow research in New York, but we never banded our by-catch so it was nice finally getting the opportunity to band one. A couple other highlights from today were a Yellow Palm Warbler and Wilson's Warbler.

-Michael Gamble

Red-winged Blackbird (hatch-year, male)

Little Bear
Today at Little Bear we caught only about half as many birds as yesterday, but that still meant we had 96 new birds and 28 recaptures. You know you've just come off of a very busy day when you cross the hundred bird mark and everyone thinks it's been a slow morning.

Like yesterday, Gray Catbirds and Yellow-rumped Warblers dominated the numbers, making up about 2/3 of our total. There were a few interesting birds in the mix though, as we did have our first-of-season Orange-crowned Warblers and a Yellow Palm Warbler (along with an individual of the more common Western subspecies). A few straggler warblers ended up in the nets as well, with two Prairie Warblers and another late Northern Waterthrush.

The wind pattern for the next few days seems likely to lead to a decrease in numbers. The next push of migrants will probably come sometime this upcoming weekend when the forecast calls for another shift in the winds.

--Blaine

SpeciesCaptain Sam's Little Bear
New Recaps New Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
1
-
-
-
Carolina Chickadee
-
-
-
1
Brown Creeper
1
-
-
-
House Wren
-
-
1
-
Carolina Wren
-
-
-
2
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
-
-
1
-
Golden-crowned Kinglet
1
-
-
-
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
1
1
-
2
Hermit Thrush
1
2
-
-
Gray Catbird
11
6
33
15
Northern Mockingbird
-
-
1
-
Northern Waterthrush
-
-
1
-
Orange-crowned Warbler
-
-
2
-
Common Yellowthroat
2
2
3
3
American Redstart
2
-
2
1
Northern Parula
1
-
-
-
Palm Warbler (Yellow)
1
-
1
-
Palm Warbler (Western)
2
-
1
-
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle)
11
-
36
3
Prairie Warbler
-
-
2
-
Wilson's Warbler
1
-
-
-
Song Sparrow
-
-
1
-
Swamp Sparrow
-
3
4
1
White-throated Sparrow
-
1
-
-
Northern Cardinal
-
1
2
-
Indigo Bunting
-
-
5
-
Painted Bunting
1
-
-
-
Red-winged Blackbird
1
-
-
-




 Banding Stats Captain Sam's Little Bear TOTAL
# Birds Banded
38
96
134
# of Recaptures
16
28
44
# of Species
17
18
27
Effort (net-hours)
106.6
116.5
223.1
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
50.7
106.4
79.8
# 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)

412 birds banded, 52 recaptures at KIBS today!

Captain Sam's
It was another busy day out on the "Spit" with 205 new birds and 24 recaptures of 32 different species.  We banded our first-of-the-season Northern Flicker and Gray-cheeked Thrush along with 3 more Brown Creepers, a Bay-breasted Warbler, and a Nashville Warbler.  Before yesterday, we had only ever banded one Brown Creeper in 8 years and now we have had 4 in two days!  Another highlight included 4 "Yellow" Palm Warblers.  The "Yellow" Palm Warbler is the eastern subspecies characterized by it's larger size and overall yellow appearance.  The "Western" Palm Warbler is brownish overall with exception to its yellow undertail coverts.  See a post from 2010 for more.

We also banded 6 Yellow-billed Cuckoos which could be a one-day record for KIBS.  The best way to age Yellow-billed Cuckoos it to look at the outer tail feather (rectrix).  One of the cuckoos we banded today had lost a couple of its outer rectrices sometime after it fledged this summer and replaced them with adult looking ones.  This gave us a great opportunity to compare adult and juvenile rectrices on the same bird.


As you can see from the photo above, the "adult" rectrix is much broader and there is a clear break between the dark upper webbing and the white tip.  The juvenile retrix is narrower the darker upper webbing fades into the white at the tip.

A quick peek at the radar is showing a little movement along the NC coast tonight but it pales in comparison to Friday and Saturday night.

-Aaron

Little Bear

Today was a record smashing day at Little Bears station. Prior to today our previous record was set on 10/22/2016 a.k.a yesterday at 154 birds. Today we caught 235 birds total with 207 of those being new birds. The species diversity was lower today then yesterday with most of the birds being Myrtle Warblers and Catbirds. We did get a few species who were usual earlier in the season but highly unusual this late in the season. These stragglers included a Northern Waterthrush and a Yellow Warbler.

We caught two Tennessee Warblers today. These warblers breed primarily in the boreal forests of Canada. They specialize in eating one particular food source up their called the spruce budworm. Tennessse Warblers population fluctuates with the abundance of spruce budworms. In the fall they migrate South passing through Kiawah Island on their way to Central America where they spend the winter.



  Species Captain Sam's Little Bear
New Recaps New Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
6
-
3
-
Northern Flicker
1
-
-
-
Eastern Phoebe
3
-
5
-
Blue-headed Vireo
1
-
-
-
Red-eyed Vireo
1
-
-
-
Brown Creeper
3
-
-
-
House Wren
2
1
1
1
Carolina Wren
-
1
-
-
Golden-crowned Kinglet
5
-
4
-
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
17
2
15
2
Gray-cheeked Thrush
1
-
-
-
Swainson's Thrush
1
-
1
-
Hermit Thrush
7
1
2
-
Gray Catbird
22
9
55
17
Brown Thrasher
-
-
-
1
Northern Mockingbird
2
2
-
-
House Finch
1
-
-
-
Northern Waterthrush
-
-
1
-
Black-and-white Warbler
1
-
1
-
Tennessee Warbler
-
-
2
-
Nashville Warbler
1
-
-
-
Common Yellowthroat
17
3
12
-
American Redstart
1
-
2
1
Cape May Warbler
-
-
2
-
Bay-breasted Warbler
1
-
-
-
Yellow Warbler
-
-
-
1
Black-throated Blue Warbler
6
-
3
-
Palm Warbler
20
-
7
-
Yellow-rumped Warbler
62
1
83
1
Prairie Warbler
2
-
-
-
Eastern Towhee
1
-
-
1
Song Sparrow
4
-
2
-
Swamp Sparrow
6
-
2
-
White-throated Sparrow
3
-
-
-
Northern Cardinal
-
3
-
1
Indigo Bunting
5
-
3
-
Painted Bunting
2
-
1
1




 Banding Stats Captain Sam's Little Bear TOTAL
# Birds Banded
205
207
412
# of Recaptures
23
27
50
# of Species
32
25
37
Effort (net-hours)
182.0
120.0
302.0
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
125.3
195.0
153.0
# of Nets
26
20
46

Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)
Blaine Carnes (LB)
Mattie VandenBoom (LB)
Alison Nevins (CS)
Col Lauzau (LB)
Michael Gamble (CS)
Michael Rodgers (LB)
Ryan Donnelly (LB)
Jake Zadik (LB)
David McLean (CS)
Juliana Smith (CS)
Nancy Raginski (CS)