October 10, 2017

Another migration banding session at the Possum Long Banding Station was completed today.  We banded 8 birds and one was a 1 new arrival.  A lot of the fun was watching the other birds high in the ficus tree.  We noted there are still Baltimore Orioles, Scarlet and Summer Tanagers, Swainson's Thrushes, and Red-eyed Vireos around.  However, alas, we did not band any of these! 

We did band 3 Black-throated Blue Warblers.  There were many more on the property.  The photo below is of a young male with traces of white on its throat/chin.  The adult male is entirely black there.

Black-throated Blue Warbler

We banded our first of the season Veery.  Glad to have thrushes on site.

Veery

Photo by Megan Ekman

In addition to 2 Ovenbirds and an American Redstart, we banded a female Painted Bunting.  I don't know how many times I have reminded people that the green ones might not be female.  However this one is and we photographed the wing to show the feathers that show this bird is an adult (at least 15 months old) and no longer has the juvenal plumage that a young male would show.  The short feathers to the right of my thumb have green edging.

Painted Bunting (female)

A few of us hung around to see if the Monarchs were returning to the property.  Hurricane Irma blew away a lot of blooms.  Nancy Price noted a female Monarch laying eggs.  We captured it and it became our first tagged Monarch for the property.  There's an event on November 11th at Possum Long and we hope to share this tagging with children attending the event.  

Tagged Monarch

Next scheduled banding session will be October 17, 2017.  Nets go up at 7:15 am.

April 25, 2017 and a few more

April 25 will likely go down in the record books for numbers of birds.  Winds favorable for seeing migrants finally arrived and I was out of town!  Permit holder Pete Grannis with support from Jim and Roy banded a total of 24 birds:  12 Black-throated Blue Warblers, 3 Ovenbirds, 2 Gray-cheeked Thrushes, an Indigo Bunting, a Common Yellowthroat, a Veery, a Swainson's Thrush, a Gray Catbird, an American Redstart, and a Black-and-white Warbler.  My thanks to this crew who made it possible to not miss this wave of birds.  There might be more western winds later this week and we will be out there Tuesday or not!

Indigo Bunting

Photo by Pete Grannis

Black-throated Blue Warbler

Photo by Pete Grannis

Ovenbird

Photo by Pete Grannis

Black-and-white Warbler

Photo by Roy Netherton

Gray-cheeked Thrush

Photo by Roy Netherton

Our other permit holder, Bill LaFramboise, ran two sessions (April 22 and April 28) even though winds were not as favorable.  Several Northern Cardinals were banded as was a Gray Catbird and our final Painted Bunting.

Gray Catbird

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

Painted Bunting (SY)

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

Northern Cardinal

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

So, there should be a few more sessions at Possum Long and then we will break for the summer and see you all again sometime in August.  A future post will let you know when.

Next Possum Long Session will be on Tuesday, May 2.  Nets open at 6:45.  Remember pouring rain will delay or cancel a session.

October 13 and 16, 2016

We did two more impromptu sessions this week and it was really worth it.  This fall has been spectacular for birds.  On Thursday we banded TWENTY-FIVE birds including our first Painted Buntings of the season.  We have dark green bands again so we adorned this green (born this summer, sex unknown) with one.  We also banded a second young green Painted Bunting.  (Only 79 to go to break the 1000 mark!)  On Sunday we added 11 more birds to the banded list (6 species).

Painted Bunting (young bird, sex unknown)

We banded a whopping 10 Gray Catbirds on Thursday and 2 on Sunday.  

Gray Catbird - one of twelve!!!

We had a one day high of 4 White-eyed Vireos.  Good comparison of the differences in the eye color. We did remember to check the "brown-eyed" young one in case in might possibly be a Thick-billed Vireo but it was clearly a young White-eyed. 

White-eyed Vireo (adult)

White-eyed Vireo - born this summer

Warblers were quite numerous but diversity is down somewhat.  We banded (adding both days) 14 birds of 5 species.  One Northern Parula, 5 American Redstarts, 6 Black-throated Blue Warblers, 1   Ovenbird and 1 Hooded Warbler.  We also saw Prairie, Pine, Black-and-white, and Yellow-throated Warblers.  

Northern Parula

Hooded Warbler - male

Black-throated Blue Warbler - young male

Ovenbird stare down

Other birds banded were a Veery, 1 Swainson's Thrush, 1 Blue Jay, and 1 Indigo Bunting.  Robin saw a banded Indigo Bunting by the pond on Sunday and observed a band.  She also found a great bird for the day. This Rose-breasted Grosbeak is a young male.  It was devouring some Beautyberry.  What a great food source this plant is.  We have seen so many species feeding on the fruit and insects.  Can you find the Grosbeak's companion?

young male Rose-breasted Grosbeak feasting on the Beautyberry

Rose-breasted Grosbeak in Beautyberry with a Gray Catbird

As in the last post the next scheduled banding is Tuesday, October 18.  Nets go up at 7:00 am.  

October 9, 2016 and a bit from October 2

October 11 Banding cancelled  -See you on October 18


Last post I forgot to include some photos from our previous weekend session.  On October 2, we caught five birds.  Most exciting was our first Eastern Screech-Owl.  We had one in the net previously but did not have the proper band.  This time we were ready.  The bird was a red morph and was recently born.  It's feathers were still early ones, not downy but still fluffy.  This gave our bird a "stuffed animal" look.

Eastern Screech-Owl

Had it not been for the owl, our top bird would have been a Hooded Warbler.  Unfortunately we only got wing and tail shots of this species.  Other birds caught were a Veery, a Gray-cheeked Thrush and an Ovenbird.  The Veery was quite interesting with some white feathers in both wings and a lost tail.  We recaptured this same Veery on 10/9 and the tail was growing in.  The white feathers were on both wings so not from some type of injury.

Gray-cheeked Thrush

Veery

October 9 was quite exciting,  We recaptured a Painted Bunting that was banded as a young, green bird in March and now shows its male colors.  We also saw a banded green.  The buntings are returning!!!

We banded a total of 14 birds and had 4 recaptures (the Painted Bunting, the Veery, and 2 Ovenbirds).  

The Gray Catbirds are back!  We banded three.  We also banded 2 of their close relatives - Northern Mockingbirds.  The photo below is of a young mocker.  Its eyes are not yet intensely yellow.  We suspect the beautyberry near one net is now ripe.  We haven't had mockingbirds recently.  We also caught a third mockingbird but released it unbanded.  It was not a healthy bird, possibly having avian pox.  

Northern Mockingbird

Two White-eyed Vireos were exciting and a great comparison of eye color.  The young one was still more gray than white-eyed.  

White-eyed Vireo

We also had another Northern Cardinal, also young as were most of the recent birds.  They must have had a great nesting season.  

Northern Cardinal

In the warbler category we did quite well.  We banded two  Ovenbirds, a Common Yellowthroat, two Black-throated blue Warblers, and a first for the property, Blue-winged Warbler!

Blue-winged Warbler

Next banding session: To be determined, hopefully October 18.  Do not park on Hibiscus.  The dead pine tree has been dropping branches.  High winds may also cancel this session.

October 4, 2016

With Hurricane Matthew's progress delayed we were able to band on Tuesday.  (Matthew didn't hit until later on Thursday.)  Migrants were still fairly plentiful.  Nancy set a few extra nets to extend our coverage of the trails.  Good thing too!!

We caught and banded 5 birds.  We also had a recaptured Ovenbird.  A few migrants hung out high in the ficus tree.  First off was another Veery, this one was an adult.

Veery

We also caught three warbler species:  Ovenbird, Black-throated Blue Warbler, and Northern Parula.  Not much new to say about the Ovenbird.  The Black-throated Blue was a young male.  The Northern Parula was male.

Ovenbird

 Black-throated Blue Warbler

Northern Parula

So, the extra long net caught a new Florida bird for me, a new bird banded, and a new property bird.  Nancy extracted and I banded a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher.  This bird is rarely detected in Florida.  

Yellow-bellied Flycatcher

both photos

So, the objective of our study is still being met with new species being documented for the property.  Migration is a strange phenomenon.  Last spring was dismal.  It is hard to persist when you put out a lot of effort and have low return.  This season might have just made up for last spring!

Painted Buntings are now returning.  I am getting reports of a few banded returns.  Soon we will be banding them again!

Next banding session will again depend on weather.  Matthew may circle back and depending on the path, if we get wind and rain, we will not band on Tuesday.  If the weather is fine, nets will go up at 7:00 am on October 11.  There is debris on the property so take no risks.  Avoid coming in the Hibiscus entrance unless you use the Woods trail.  Dead pine tree is dropping limbs.  

October 1, 2016 Migration bliss

Due to approaching weather (Hurricane Matthew), multitudes of great migrant reports, and many good birds at Possum Long yesterday, I decided to run a session today.  Well worth it!  We saw 27 species (many migrants including a bunch of Cape May Warblers) and banded 14 birds (8 species) and recaptured 2 more.

Once again we banded Swainson's Thrush - three of them.  There were more unbanded ones viewed.

Swainson's Thrush

We also banded three more Ovenbirds.

Ovenbird

One of the species banded early in the morning was a Northern Parula.  This is a young bird with the typical red and/or slate breast band are not developed.  The wing bars and yellow lower bill are visible.  

Northern Parula

Photo by Robin Potvin

A very big surprise was a Swainson's Warbler.  The previous ones (only 3!) we banded were in September.  Upon returning home I read that there was one banded in Georgia today so maybe more will be coming through.  

Swainson's Warbler

Photo by Robin Potvin

The Worm-eating Warbler we banded was a good species to compare with the Swainson's Warbler. The central crown stripe and bill size look quite different.

Worm-eating Warbler

Today was a "three species of thrushes" day.  In addition to the Swainson's Thrush above, we banded a Veery and a Gray-cheeked Thrush.  The Gray-cheeked measured beyond a doubt to be well out of the range of Bicknell's Thrush.  The Veery, below, shows the classic red/rufous color of this species.  

Gray-cheeked Thrush

Veery

The last species banded was Black-throated Blue Warbler.  Banding three of them made for nice age and subspecies comparisons.  Two of the birds were adult males, the other was a young bird.  Two were the Appalachian subspecies (black marking on the back) and one was from the non-Appalachian population.

Black-throated Blue Warbler

Black-throated Blue Warbler

Appalachian subspecies

Photos by Robin Potvin

Our recaptures were exciting.  Both had been banded in September, 2013 as hatch-year birds.  So both are three years old.

White-eyed Vireo

Blue Jay

Next banding:  Tuesday, October 4, but Hurricane Matthew may cancel this session.  Email keepbirding2@yahoo.com if you want to be notified of session status.  If clear, nets go up at 6:45 am.  

September 29, 2015

Today rain threatened us and the air was very muggy.  We got rained out by 10 am.  Despite that we caught another Veery and recaptured an Ovenbird from last week.

 Veery

Photo by Jane Wiewora

The Veery was a hatch year bird.  This age was partially determined by the white tips on the greater coverts.  Also seen in the photo is one of the feathers that is emarginated - notched, on the upper edge of the primary.  This is indicated by the smaller arrow.  Other feathers are emarginated but this one is easiest to see.

Veery

Photo by Jane Wiewora

The Ovenbird had no fat when we captured it last week.  Today it was beginning to show traces of fat.  Fat is a good thing for migrating birds. It is great to be able to document that migrating birds remain on the property in order to build up fat supplies.  That teamed with site fidelity data show how valuable this property is as a stopping place .  Migrants depend on this 4.7 acre property in the middle of suburbia!  May it remain vegetated so that there is food for them.

Ovenbird

Photo by Jane Wiewora

Next banding:  October 6.  Nets go up at 6:30 am.

September 21 & 22, 2015

We banded Monday and Tuesday this week and caught 6 birds each day.  At first light the day started out with a bit of chasing - not us looking for a rarity but first we saw a Barred Owl chasing an immature Red-shouldered Hawk.  Then the hawk was mobbed by Blue Jays with some chasing by the hawk.  Soon after a squirrel chased the hawk away.  Maybe that one should have been the other way around??

immature Red-shouldered Hawk

Photo by Nancy LaFramboise

Soon we had birds.  We caught a total of 3 Ovenbirds, a Blue Jay, and a Worm-eating Warbler.

Worm-eating Warbler

Photo b Nancy LaFramboise

The sixth bird was a Red-bellied Woodpecker and it was a hatch year bird.  The red on the nape was just coming in.  Adult males have full  red at the back of the head from the bill to the nape; females have more limited red from the back of the head to the nape.  Hopefully you can see the ends of the new red feathers and see the sheaths that cover newly growing feathers.

Red-bellied Woodpecker (back of head)

Photo by Nancy Price.

On Tuesday we also caught six birds - 4 Ovenbirds, another Blue Jay, and most exciting was a Veery; the first thrush of the season.  This bird had a good load of fat and no doubt will be on its way soon.

Veery

Photo by Jane Wiewora

We also recaptured a White-eyed Vireo which was originally banded as a hatch year bird on September 23. 2013.  It was recapured a little more than a year later on October 21, 2014.  This kind of site fidelity is one of the things we are documenting as part of the banding project.

White-eyed Vireo

Photo by Nancy LaFramboise

Though I don't understand the need to plant cactus at the Possum Long property, it was quite beautiful to see one of the large ones blooming.  

Next banding session:  September 29.  Nets go up at 6:30 am.