Blue Skies and Bluebirds

 Captain Sams:

Contrary to our predictions for today, things drastically slowed down with a total of 57 birds caught. The winds came from the North, but they were not as strong, and the temperature not as cool as the previous night. We got a wide variety of species with a second Sharp-shinned Hawk caught in the morning, and a first of the season Eastern Bluebird. There were the sparrows, White-throated, Song, and Swamp, as well as Eastern Phoebes, Common Yellowthroats, and Yellow-rumped Warblers (Myrtle). A recaptured Ovenbird also was caught. These once common birds are now anomalies, as migration slows. We have a week of South winds and warm temperatures ahead of us, and the station keeps cruising along ... slowly.

AHY Female Eastern Bluebird

Little Bear:

Today was a little better than yesterday. We ended with a total of 52 birds and most of the numbers came from a flock of Myrtle Warblers that flew into the net. It was a little quite after our first 2 runs but we enjoyed the time talking about birds and playing a bird guessing game. We used the Sibleys guide to pick out a bird and are told the wingspan, length and mass of the bird and we try to figure out what bird we are describing. It was nice to pass the time in between net runs with a fun, learning game.

Our highlight of the day was catching another White-crowned Sparrow. We did recapture on of our previously (this year) banded Golden-crowned Kinglet too, which was nice to see again. 

With it being a little on the slow end near the end of the season, I am hoping to still catch a good number of birds before we close up!

-Kristin

Note:  All banding, marking, and sampling is being conducted under a federally authorized Bird Banding Permit issued by the U.S. Geological Survey’s BBL

Species	Captain Sams		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo	1	-	-	-
Sharp-shinned Hawk	1	-	-	-
Eastern Phoebe	2	-	-	-
Golden-crowned Kinglet	-	-	-	1
Ruby-crowned Kinglet	7	-	4	-
House Wren	-	1	-	1
Gray Catbird	3	2	5	9
Eastern Bluebird	1	-	-	-
Hermit Thrush	3	1	-	-
White-crowned Sparrow	-	-	1	-
White-throated Sparrow	1	-	-	-
Song Sparrow	2	2	-	-
Swamp Sparrow	2	-	2	1
Eastern Towhee	-	-	1	-
Ovenbird	-	1	-	-
Orange-crowned Warbler	-	-	1	-
Common Yellowthroat	2	-	-	-
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle)	23	1	23	1
Northern Cardinal	-	1	-	1
Painted Bunting	-	-	1	-

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	48	38	86
# of Recaptures	9	14	23
# of Species	15	11	19
Effort (net-hours)	164.4	120	284.4
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	34.7	43.3	38.3
# of Nets	32	25	57

2023 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	4,133	3,164	7,297
# of Recaptures	997	674	1,671
# of Species	81	85	95
Effort (net-hours)	13,331.25	8,216.05	21,547.3
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	38.5	46.7	41.62
# of Days	81	69	-

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)

Kristin Attinger (LB)

Brittany Holliker (CS)

Matt Hixson (LB)

Camille Blose (CS)

Wentao Yang (LB)

Natalie Miller (CS)