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Archived Postings

September 4, 2008 – September 10, 2008

Banding over the last few days at the LSLBO was quite enjoyable. We saw days with good migratory passage, decent banding, and great weather. The cooler September weather actually helps our work with the migrants. Birds are less active in hot weather. We’ve seen trends in the middle of the summer when almost all activity stops when temperature becomes ridiculously hot. The September sun does not have a lot of power to it, so the days can be pleasantly warm and the birds are still active for longer in the day. Yellow-rumped warblers were migrating in large numbers for almost the entire week. Their numbers peaked on the 10th with over 800 counted. They were joined by orange-crowned warblers, white-crowned sparrows, American pipits, dark-eyed juncos, golden-crowned kinglets, Wilson’s warblers, palm warblers, and Lapland longspurs. The best bird watching involved just sitting and watching a patch of trees all sorts of birds would eventually show up. The number and diversity of birds migrating through was reflected in the banding. A few days of banding saw totals reaching the mid-thirties. Not too bad for this time of year. These busier banding days saw a variety of different birds in the nets, reaching 15 different species a day. One of the notable species was the first blackpoll warbler of the year. The park interpreters presented an excellent evening amphitheater show this past summer focusing on the migration of this species. Early this spring I recall seeing a vesper sparrow and saying “man, I would love to catch a vesper sparrow, I have never banded one before”. Well, four months later, it happened. I banded my very first vesper sparrow, which turns out to be only the second one captured at the LSLBO. The first one was banded way back in the spring of 1997. We also added a new species to the LSLBO sightings checklist. A pair of brant flew past. Brant are a species of geese that breed far north and are more commonly found along the west coast. The pair flew past quickly, but there was no mistaking what they were. Owl monitoring is still going a little slow. Only 7 owls have been banded in 15 nights. That’s not very good, we should have owls coming out of our ears by now. I do not know why the owls are going so slowly, but we’ll keep trying until they begin to show up. The set up for owl banding makes the slower nights go much faster. Owls are banded at the staff accommodations, on the kitchen table. This may seem unsanitary, but the roommates are not complaining. There are often movies playing in the background and I discovered a great new flavour of ice-cream to enjoy while watching the movies. Overlapping owl banding and songbird migration work is a vicious split shift, so making the evening work as comfortable as possible is of critical importance. Things have gotten so comfortable that on some nights owl banding is conducted in pajamas.

2010