Saturday, November 28, 2020

Banding Marathon

 CAPTAIN SAMS

A few days ago I had high hopes for today's banding session.  The forecast called for cloudy skies, cooler temperatures, and low winds following a mini cold front that produced NW winds.  All of these things are ideal conditions for banding birds.  Then yesterday, rain crept into the forecast and somewhat spoiled my expectations.  It wasn't a washout, fortunately, as the rain was light and spotty most of the morning and not heavy enough to shut the nets down.  Bird activity was steady all morning. The rain cleared the area by 2:00pm, and I decided to stay out to see what might be moving around the rest of the afternoon.  I ended up banding from 6:00am-5:00pm and in that time I caught 35 new birds and 30 recaptures of 12 species.  The highlight of the day was a Yellow-breasted Chat.  This is not that unusual as a small number of chats spend the winter in the SC.  This individual had some fat reserves therefore it likely that he was a late migrant.  

Yellow-breasted Chat (hatch-year, male)

I also had several more returning bird including 6 Yellow-rumped Warblers and 1 Orange-crowned Warbler.  The Orange-crowned Warbler was originally banded on 11/25/2018.  She was also captured last year on 11/13/2019.  

-Aaron


  Species  Captain Sam'sLittle Bear
NewRecapsNewRecaps
Eastern Phoebe
-1

Ruby-crowned Kinglet
-1

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
-1

Carolina Chickadee
-1

American Robin
2-

Gray Catbird
57

Yellow-breasted Chat
1-

Swamp Sparrow
21

Orange-crowned Warbler
-2

Common Yellowthroat
-1

Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle)
2514

Northern Cardinal

1



Today's Banding StatsCaptain Sam'sLittle BearTOTAL
# Birds Banded
35
-
35
# of Recaptures
30
-
30
# of Species
12
-
12
Effort (net-hours)
325.65
-
325.65
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
20.0
-
20.0
# of Nets
30
-
-


2020 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats Captain Sam'sLittle BearTOTAL
# Birds Banded
4560
2633
7193
# of Recaptures
1157
508
1665
# of Species
80
71
92
Effort (net-hours)
13633.33
7836.82
21470.15
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
41.5
40.1
41.3
# of Days10379-


Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)