November 4, 5, and 7, 2017

Things have really slowed down yet we are still catching a few new birds.  We banded at PB 32 on Saturday and at Possum Long on Sunday and Tuesday.

Painted Bunting sessions will become more of our entries over the next few months.  We will continue at Possum Long until early December but will be taking a break over the holidays.

Our return trip to PB 32 was productive.  We banded 2 new buntings and recaptured another.  It is always great visiting with our hosts.

Painted Bunting

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

On Sunday we tried setting up at the pond at Possum Long.  Unfortunately the water is high so we cannot span the water as we have in the past.  We did manage to catch a Painted Bunting, 2 Gray Catbirds, a Common Yellowthroat, and an Eastern Phoebe.  Eastern Phoebes are winter residents and we rarely catch them.

Eastern Phoebe

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

Gray Catbird

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

Common Yellowthroat

Photo by Bill LaFramboise

At our regular Tuesday session we again caught Painted Buntings, two of them.  The good news is there seem to still be some banded and unbanded ones around.  Maybe they are still arriving??  We also caught a Common Yellowthroat that had been banded last year.  Nice to see some site fidelity in that species.

Painted Bunting - hatch year, sex unknown

Photo by Pete Grannis

Common Yellowthroat

Photo by Pete Grannis

The next regularly scheduled Possum Long banding will be on November 14.  Nets go up at 6:15.  

November 8, 11, and 13, 2016

Sometimes there is too much to do and so little time.  My apologies for being late posting this but at least there are a lot of birds to report!  Tuesday, at Possum Long, we moved operations closer to the pond and it paid off.  It was a warbler blitz:  6 species and 11 birds!  One Northern Parula, 1 Ovenbird, 1 Prairie, 2 Palm, 1 Black-throated Blue, and 5 Yellow-rumped (Myrtle) Warblers. There was another warbler species recaptured - a Common Yellowthroat.  Also recaptured were 2 Painted Buntings and 2 House Wrens.

It seemed a bit late for the Ovenbird and the BT Blue but neither flagged as particularly rare on eBird.

Black-throated Blue Warbler (female)

Northern Parula

Photo by Pat Marshall

Prairie Warbler 

Photo by Pat Marshall

Ovenbird

Palm Warbler

recaptured House Wren originally banded in 2015

On November 11, we were once again hosted at PB 27.  This location has two caged feeders that perfectly fit our traps.  We banded 9 new Painted Buntings and recaptured 3 more.  Two of the three recaptures were from Season Two (early 2015 - two seasons ago).  This is great data for us.  

Painted Bunting (glowing in the sun)

Photo by Pete Grannis

Painted Bunting

Photo by Pete Grannis

We did a supplemental session today (Nov 13).  We banded 5 new birds and recaptured 2.  We banded one Gray Catbird today.  It seems odd to be "missing" them but we hadn't banded many recently. Much different from Tuesday we only banded 2 Yellow-rumped Warblers.  Extra bonuses were a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and an Eastern Phoebe, only our second banded at Possum Long

 Eastern Phoebe 

Gray Catbird

Next Tuesday session:  November 15.  Nets go up at 6:15 am.  Remember to find us closer to the pond.  We WILL NOT BE at Possum Long on 11/22.  Watch future posts for our return.

December 10, 2013

I must say that I have a very enthusiastic banding crew and I appreciate them all.  Since the net across the pond was so productive and since we had yet to capture the House Wren and Eastern Phoebe, we placed two nets across the pond and 5 elsewhere on the property.

First we got a Yellow-rumped Warbler.  You can see the obvious yellow rump and also the less obvious faint eye line indicating the eastern "Myrtle" subspecies .

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Photo by Bill Eaton

Then Nancy Price brought the long-awaited Eastern Phoebe to the banding table.  We examined this flycatcher up close noting the bristles around its beak and the lovely yellow color of the interior of its mouth.  The legs were small in proportion to this larger bird's body.  The aerial life does not require strong legs.

Eastern Phoebe

Photo by Bill Eaton

Eastern Phoebe

Photo by Bill Eaton

Next on the agenda was the House Wren.  It was fun to reacquaint myself with a bird we frequently caught at the MAPS station where I used to band.

House Wren

Photo by Bill Eaton

The last new bird of the day was a Common Yellowthroat.  This was a young male bird.  The black edge of the face mask is just starting to appear.

Common Yellowthroat

Photo by Bill Eaton

We also had a recapture of a Painted Bunting originally banded in March.  A green Painted Bunting is either a female or a young male.  By looking we cannot tell age or sex even now.  Since we know when the bird was banded and time has now passed and the bird has not molted in the male coloration, we now know the bird is female.  

Painted Bunting

Photo by Bill Eaton

Crystal kept busy today noting birds on the property and photographing some of our surroundings.  A pair of American Kestrels kept us enthralled and this pink mushroom was quite different:

 

Both photos by Crystal Conway

By popular vote, next banding will be December 17.  Nets go up at 6:30.  We will take a holiday break and expect to resume on December 31 with a visiting scout troop.  Let's see how the year end totals are on the last day of 2013!