The Notorious RBGR

Captain Sam's:

Just like the Simon & Garfunkel song April Come She Will, the September winds blew chilly and cold last night, except for the chilly and cold part...okay, they just blew. But they brought with them a load of birds and me! That's right folks, your friendly neighborhood bird nerd is back at Cap'n Sammy's.

Yup, that's me...just as handsome as ever*

Alright, alright quit gawking, its time to get serious! So as I was saying - birds. Well, we went out for our first net run today, which included our amazingly helpful volunteers Bill Kee and Lydia Moore, and a few of us ran out of bird bags and had to run back to the station for more, that's about when we realized it was going to be a big day. We had flocks of Common Yellowthroats (97), Gray Catbirds (32), and Red-eyed Vireos (16) but that's not why you're here is it? You're here because we caught a Rose-Breasted Grosbeak! She was an absolute stunner and we all took turns getting bit by her "gros" (french for large) beak just so we could say we held her. Check her out!

Look at that chompin' beak! 

We can tell she's a female by the yellow "armpit" color (Photos by: Dave Sandahl)

We ended the day with, get this, 203 total birds at the station! The weather will slowly be changing as October ushers itself in, so keep an eye on the blog for some really good birds over the next few weeks.

- Dave Sandhill Crane

*not actually me - (Photo: standard.co.uk)

Little Bear:

Today was great! With some north west winds kicking in over the night into the morning, we had a great push of birds today! Setting our record of highest birds banded at little bear this season with 128 newly banded birds and two recaptured birds. Both recaptured birds were Gray Catbirds that were banded last year as a hatch year and they decided to come back for a visit to see everyone, how sweet of them! The highlight of the day would be our first for Little Bear is the Eastern Wood Pewee!
This photo below showed the amount of birds we had during our first run!

Photo Credits: Arcata Leavitt

-Kristin

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Eastern Wood Pewee	2	-	1	-
Traill's Flycatcher	2	-	-	-
White-eyed Vireo	3	1	3	-
Red-eyed Vireo	16	-	17	-
House Wren	1	-	2	-
Carolina Chickadee	-	1	-	-
Gray Catbird	27	5	16	2
Brown Thrasher	2	-	-	-
Veery	3	-	-	-
Swainson's Thrush	2	-	-	-
Wood Thrush	2	-	-	-
Yellow-breasted Chat	1	-	-	-
Ovenbird	1	-	-	-
Northern Waterthrush	4	1	1	-
Common Yellowthroat	95	2	64	-
American Redstart	11	-	6	-
Magnolia Warbler	1	-	-	-
Yellow Warbler	2	-	2	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	3	-	4	-
Western Palm Warbler	7	-	10	-
Prairie Warbler	2	-	1	-
Summer Tanager	1	-	-	-
Rose-breasted Grosbeak	1	-	-	-
Painted Bunting	1	2	1	-

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sam's	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	190	128	318
# of Recaptures	13	2	15
# of Species	23	11	24
Effort (net-hours)	147	72	219
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	138.1	180.6	152.1
# of Nets	28	20	48

2019 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sam's	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	1458	832	2290
# of Recaptures	332	153	485
# of Species	54	47	65
Effort (net-hours)	5,097.45	1,834.8	6,932.25
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	35.1	53.7	40.0
# of Days	40	31	-

Banding Staff
Aaron Given (CS)
Dan Errichetti (CS)
Dave Sandahl (CS) 
Bethany Darby (CS)
Bill Kee (CS)
Lydia Moore (CS)
Josh Lefever (LB)
Kristin Attinger (LB)
Arcata Leavitt (LB)