Myrtle Sunday

 CAPTAIN SAMS

It was a lot busier today with 128 new birds and 7 recaptures of 18 different species. While opening nets, we heard constant chips from hundreds of Yellow-rumped Warblers migrating over the station. We ended up capturing 101 Yellow-rumped Warblers out of the 128 new birds captured. We also enjoyed watching a couple thousand Tree Swallows circle around the station all morning and come down on a wax myrtle bush on the edge of the marsh and strip it of its berries. 

-Michael

LITTLE BEAR

It was another good day at Little Bear today, we caught 44 new birds and recaptured 11 for a total of 55. It started off fairly warm but cooled down unexpectedly as we continued netting later into the day. Unfortunately, this weather shift didn't seem to be in our favor and Little Bear slowed down dramatically during the latter half of the day. It is typical for Little Bear to be busy during the early hours of the morning, but does often slow down as the sun rises and heats up the dunes. 

Today, we managed to catch Little Bears second Yellow-bellied Sapsucker for the season. Sapsuckers are the only migratory woodpecker in the eastern United States and will spend their winters in South Carolina but are found further north during the breeding season. We captured a hatch year male, who showcased some remaining juvenile feathers within his body plumage but had also partially molted into his new formative plumage. This is only Little Bears second Sapsucker of the season, so we were all quite excited when it showed up in our nets.

 

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (hatch year, male)

- Noah Nei

Species	Captain Sam's		Little Bear
	New	Recaps	New	Recaps
Yellow-billed Cuckoo	1	-	-	-
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker	-	-	1	-
Downy Woodpecker	-	1	-	1
Eastern Phoebe	-	-	1	-
Ruby-crowned Kinglet	1	-	1	1
House Wren	1	-	1	3
Carolina Wren	1	1	1	-
Gray Catbird	3	4	6	3
Hermit Thrush	3	1	1	-
House Finch	1	-	-	-
White-throated Sparrow	1	-	-	-
Song Sparrow	2	-	2	-
Swamp Sparrow	4	-	6	1
Orange-crowned Warbler	1	-	-	-
Common Yellowthroat	1	-	2	1
Black-throated Blue Warbler	1	-	1	-
Palm Warbler (western)	2	-	1	-
Yellow-rumped Warbler (myrtle)	101	-	18	-
Northern Cardinal	1	1	-	-
Painted Bunting	3	-	2	-

Today's Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	128	44	172
# of Recaptures	7	11	19
# of Species	18	15	20
Effort (net-hours)	179.2	132.6	311.8
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	75.3	41.5	61.3
# of Nets	32	26	58

2024 Fall Cumulative Banding Stats	Captain Sams	Little Bear	TOTAL
# Birds Banded	4,631	2,975	7,606
# of Recaptures	982	811	1,793
# of Species	85	81	99
Effort (net-hours)	11,863.9	7,415.8	19,279.7
Capture Rate (birds/100 net-hours)	47.3	51.05	48.75
# of Days	72	62

Banding Staff

Michael Gamble (CS)

Nancy Raginski (CS)

Kristin Attinger (LB)

Natalie Miller (CS)

Lisa Viviano (LB)

Noah Nei (LB)

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