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Archived Postings

August 22, 2005 – August 28, 2005

August 22 to August 28, 2005 This week, for the most part, was fairly quiet. Only 74 birds were banded during the entire week. Remember when that was the banding total for a single day? Low banding totals does not mean that migration is at its end. Despite slow banding there were a few days of heavy movement (almost 500 myrtle warblers were counted on the 27th) and there is still over a month left of migration monitoring. New species in the nets this week were dark-eyed juncos and white-crowned sparrows. Visitors have also reported seeing Canada geese and sandhill cranes starting to migrate south, but unfortunately none have been seen passing over the observatory. Northern saw-whet owl migration monitoring began this week. This owl monitoring project involves capturing northern saw-whet owls in mistnets and banding them. However, the nets cannot simply be left up to wait for an owl to fly into them because the abundance of owls moving through the area is too low. The owls need to be lured into the nets. An audio lure consisting of the northern saw-whet owl breeding call is broadcast at full volume into the night. Even though it is not breeding season, the saw-whets do respond to the broadcast, whether they are curious or really angry, and get captured in the nets. It is early in the season; we want to start monitoring to catch the first migrants. The first northern saw-whet owl of 2005 was captured, to the surprise of the banders, on August 27th. Last year, the first northern saw-whet owl was not captured until September 9th. Owl monitoring will be conducted nightly when the weather conditions permit. Everyone is welcome to check out the banding operation. But…….the owl banding is not conducted at the observatory, it is at another location. Anyone interested in helping, or simply watching, can contact Amy Wotton at (780) 849-7117, or send her an e-mail at birds@lslbo.org for more information.

2010