It was a typical November morning out at Captain Sam's with 27 new birds and 21 recaptures of 10 different species. Yellow-rumped Warblers led the way with 14 new ones being banded. Yellow-rumps also made up most of our recaps with 13, 8 of them being banded in previous seasons at KIBS. The highlights of the morning were first-of-the-season's Field Sparrow and Tree Swallow.
The Tree Swallows were swarming in the hundreds looking for some myrtle bushes to drop down on and feed on the berries. Sometimes they will come down on some myrtle bushes that are near our nets, providing us with a net full of swallows. This time, we were more proactive and tried to anticipate where they would come down next, so we set up a net near myrtle bushes that were full of berries. Towards the end of the morning, they started to swarm again and eventually dropped down to this net! Unfortunately, we only caught 2 out of the entire flock but it still was a success!
 |
| Field Sparrow (hatch-year, sex unknown) |
 |
Tree Swallow (hatch-year, sex unknown)
|
Little Bear
Thankfully the wind died down a little bit today which
allowed Little Bear to resume banding.
We banded 25 new birds and recaptured 9, representing 9 species. We finally captured our first Sharp-shinned
Hawk of the season. We have been seeing
them around the station for the past couple weeks but today was finally the
first day one hit the net and stayed. The
Sharp-shinned captured today was an after second-year male. He was aged by the lack of any juvenile
plumage and deep red eye color. Between hawks banded at
the two banding sites, Kristen was able to compile a nice comparison shot of
eye color between hatch-year, second-year, and after second-year Sharp-shinned
Hawks.
 |
| Hatch-year (Left), Second Year (Center), After Second Year (Right) |
| Species | Captain Sam's | Little Bear | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New | Recaps | New | Recaps | |
Sharp-shinned Hawk
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
Tree Swallow
|
2
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
|
3
|
-
|
2
|
-
|
Hermit Thrush
|
1
|
1
|
1
|
-
|
Gray Catbird
|
1
|
5
|
1
|
5
|
Northern Mockingbird
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
Field Sparrow
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
Song Sparrow
|
3
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
Swamp Sparrow
|
1
|
1
|
1
|
-
|
Northern Parula
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
1
|
Palm Warbler (western)
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle)
|
14
|
13
|
17
|
3
|
Prairie Warbler
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
| Banding Stats | Captain Sam's | Little Bear | TOTAL |
|---|---|---|---|
| # Birds Banded |
27
|
25
|
52
|
| # of Recaptures |
21
|
9
|
30
|
| # of Species |
10
|
9
|
13
|
| Effort (net-hours) |
171.6
|
95.0
|
266.6
|
| Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours) |
28.0
|
35.8
|
30.8
|
| # of Nets |
26
|
17
|
43
|
Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)
Mattie VandenBoom (LB)
Michael Gamble (CS)
Kristen Oliver (LB)
