Wednesday, November 8, 2023

Winter is calling

 Captain Sams:

Today's banding marked our last week here at the station, and I finally made my 1000 banded birds milestone here at Kiawah! Woo hoo! Today is also the first day of Winter in Lunar Calendar which was used by ancient Chinese long long ago, which also means our fall migration was coming to an end. As a result, we were seeing more wintering birds around the area such as the American Pipits that were flying over and giving flight calls this morning. 

Our biggest excitement from today was a larger sized raptor that swooped to net 25 when we walked by. As Aaron started to sprint and get hold of the bird, it turned around and took off in less than a second. What a shame! Earlier this morning, Aaron was just talking about his google memory told him that last year today, they caught a Red-shouldered Hawk at the station. How crazy would that be if it just happened to be another captured Red-shouldered Hawk.


-Wentao

Little Bear:

Today was a lot slower than I expected. I was hoping for some more birds and was trying to keep a steady rate of birds being captured today. We heard a large amount of chipping this morning as we were opening this morning but by our 2nd run it was very quite. It made it an interesting day for sure! It was nice to enjoy the cooler morning but the heat ended up beating us out of the station and the bugs definitely started to be more active lately. 

Even though it will be slow tomorrow as well, I am hoping for a nice little flock of Myrtles that might show up in the net. having any birds for the day is always a treat for me though.

-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 SamsLittle Bear
NewRecapsNewRecaps
Eastern Phoebe
1-1-
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
7-1-
Gray Catbird
2423
Hermit Thrush
-1--
White-crowned Sparrow
-1--
Song Sparrow
322-
Swamp Sparrow
2-1-
Eastern Towhee
---1
Orange-crowned Warbler
2-2-
Common Yellowthroat
1---
Yellow-rumped Warbler (myrtle subspecies)
14516-
Northern Cardinal
11--



Today's Banding StatsCaptain SamsLittle BearTOTAL
# Birds Banded
33
25
58
# of Recaptures
14
4
18
# of Species
11
8
12
Effort (net-hours)
164.75
127.5
292.25
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
28.5
22.7
26.0
# of Nets
32
25
57

2023 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats Captain SamsLittle BearTOTAL
# Birds Banded
4205
3,217
7,422
# of Recaptures
1021
692
1,713
# of Species
81
85
95
Effort (net-hours)
13683.35
8,468.55
22,151.9
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)
38.2
46.2
41.2
# of Days8371-

Banding Staff

Aaron Given (CS)
Kristin Attinger (LB)
Matt Hixson (LB)
Wentao Yang (CS)
Camille Blose (CS)