The Bar-tailed Godwit Returns!

Captain Sams: 

A few scattered rain storms this morning meant a late opening to the nets and very few birds overall today. However, despite the day was not without its fair share of excitement, namely that early this morning an eBird checklist was posted from the previous day at the East Beach of Kiawah that included a Bar-tailed Godwit! This is almost certainly the same individual that was found by the banding crew last October and, amazingly, stayed all the way through to April. Bar-tailed Godwits breed in a few scattered populations across the Arctic and is quite rare in South Carolina (this bird last year was the first record for the state). They're amazing birds that are perhaps most famous for making a nonstop flight in the fall between Alaska and New Zealand! To prepare for this ultramarathon across the Pacific, they are able to temporarily atrophy their internal organs to make way for more fat. 

After work today a few of us drove down to the East Beach to see the bird and it did not disappoint. We were able to find it extremely quickly with a group of Willets. A great experience to top off the day and a life bird for Brendan and Maia. 

-Aidan

Bar-tailed Godwit (left)

Little Bear

We had a bit of unexpected rain this morning as we drove the Argo into Little Bear, so we had to wait for it to pass before opening the nets. Unfortunately, there were even less birds around than yesterday, but we were able to band 7 new birds and process 4 recaptures. The highlight of the day was an after-hatch year male Cape May Warbler. Previously, I had only banded females, so this was a nice treat during this slow day. Even in nonbreeding plumage, this male was still much more vibrant and heavily streaked than the females. Throughout the morning, it continued to rain periodically, and we caught less and less birds each net run, so we decided to close for the day.

After-hatch year male Cape May Warbler

-Katie

Species	Captain Sams		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
White-eyed Vireo	-	-	-	1
Red-eyed Vireo	-	1	-	-
Brown Thrasher	-	1	-	-
Northern Waterthrush	3	-	1	2
Common Yellowthroat	7	1	-	1
Cape May Warbler	-	-	1	-
Yellow Warbler	-	-	1	-
Western Palm Warbler	2	-	-	-
Black-throated Blue Warbler	1	-	-	-
American Redstart	-	1	-	-
Prairie Warbler	2	1	2	-
Painted Bunting	-	-	2	1

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	15	7	22
# of Recaptures	5	4	9
# of Species	8	6	12
Effort (net-hours)	111.0	82.8	193.8
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	18.0	13.3	32.3
# of Nets	30	23	-

2022 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	948	669	1617
# of Recaptures	240	168	408
# of Species	41	40	50
Effort (net-hours)	4630.37	2,366.45	6996.82
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	26.7	35.4	28.9
# of Days	33	26	-

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Kristin Attinger

Nate Watkins (LB)

Katie Serba (LB)
Brendan Wang (CS) 

Aidan Place (CS)

Maia Nguyen