September 26, 2017 Opening day was hot!

Yes, opening day was hot both in terms of weather and birds.  Thankfully the thunderstorm skirted our area.  We banded a total of 20 birds (11 species).  Some ever faithful volunteers as well as some new ones were there and kept very busy.  My thanks to all of you.

We started off with a bang as our first bird was a Swainson's Warbler our fifth ever.  We really didn't expect to catch a second one later in the day!

Swainson's Warbler

After that we had a few more typical species a Northern Cardinal and our first of the season Gray Catbird. Many birds including the catbird had fat which means they still have reserves to go farther.

 Northern Cardinal

Gray Catbird

After these birds more kept coming.  We banded 1 male Painted Bunting (first one of Season 5!), 2 American Redstarts, 1 Black-throated Blue Warbler, 3 Black-and-white Warblers, a Common Yellowthroat, a White-eyed Vireo, 6 Ovenbirds, and what I consider the bird of the day.  I do think others may disagree but it was pretty good in my opinion.

Common Yellowthroat

Ovenbird

Black-and-white Warbler

Painted Bunting

Black-throated Blue Warbler

American Redstart

There were a few other migrants present on the property today including Red-eyed Vireos, a Scarlet Tanager, and Northern Parulas.  

So what I consider the bird of the day I had only banded one other of this species before and have seen under 10 of these in Florida!  We had a Chestnut-sided Warbler today.  The unique yellow-green color and chestnut sides were exciting to see up close.

Chestnut-sided Warbler

Chestnut-sided Warbler

Chestnut-sided Warbler

Photo by Robin Potvin

Quite the opening day.  Things should continue to be busy (we hope) for the next few weeks.  The next session will be on October 3.  Nets go up around 7 am.