Hooray! The birds have arrived! The diversity of species around the lab this week has exploded. Yellow warbler, black-and-white warbler, Lincoln’s sparrow, white-throated sparrow, Swainson’s thrush, least flycatcher, and western tanager, just to name a few, have arrived and are exuberantly advertising their presence with song. With an increase in birds in the area, we are starting to see some better banding totals. This makes more than just us banders happy, the educators at the Boreal Centre are also very glad to hear it since they are bringing school groups out for tours on an almost daily basis. The educators do a fantastic job whether or not we catch a bird, but being able to show students what we do is far more exciting than just hearing about it and we love fostering an appreciation of birds in young people. In the words of one impressed teenager who came out “I thought this would be a lame field trip, but birds are totally legit!” I had a winning moment this week. A few years back I was birding on Marten Mountain in the spring and saw a yellow-bellied sapsucker that was still in its juvenile plumage – something it should have moulted out of over the winter. A certain other birder didn’t entirely believe what I ‘thought’ I saw. The other day I caught a sapsucker in juvenile plumage. Solid proof that it happens. I Win. Besides that bit of fun, the highlight capture this week was a blackpoll warbler. We catch some of these warblers during fall when they are in their non-descript juvenile plumage, but it is uncommon for us to catch an adult male in its breeding plumage. Blackpoll warblers are a true wonder of the avian kingdom. They have the longest migration of any songbird in North America: an up to 19,000 km round-trip. In the spring they fly over land from Venezuela to northwest Canada and Alaska to breed but as arduous of a journey as that is, it pales in comparison to their fall migration. In the fall, blackpolls leave their breeding grounds and rather than fly south they head east, all the way to the Maritime Provinces. Once they are there, they bulk up for a few weeks and then fly out over the ocean in the general direction of Africa. Around Bermuda, they are swept up by the trade winds and blown into South America. For three days, they fly over 3000 km of open-ocean unable to stop to eat or rest at all. Any bird that isn’t strong enough will fall into the ocean and perish. When I know what these birds go through just to come up here to breed it makes me feel even more passionate about doing everything in my power to help them. Blackpoll warblers primarily nest in black spruce forests and bogs dominated by alder and willow. Both of these habitat types are sensitive to disturbances and take a long time to restore themselves if they are destroyed or altered. I, for one, hope that there will always be a home for blackpoll warblers in our northern forests.
Weekly Banding Reports
- September 28 – October 3, 2023
- September 21 – 27, 2023
- September 14 – 20, 2023
- September 7 – 13, 2023
- August 31 – September 6, 2023
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1 month ago
Friday (Feb 16) is the LAST DAY to apply for our MIGRATION FIELD ASSISTANT position at the LSLBO!If you have good birding skills and want to gain more hands-on field experience in the world of avian migration monitoring, visit our job board for more information on this rewarding position: www.lslbo.org/job-opportunities/migration-field-assistant/
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2 months ago
The LSLBO has wrapped up our 30th year of bird population monitoring in the boreal forest and it was another busy season. Check out our 2023 ANNUAL REPORT for all the highlights!www.lslbo.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Annual-Report-2023.pdfWe would like to thank our amazing field crew for all their hard work and dedication this summer. And a special thank you to all of our supporters that help us deliver our programs each year: Alberta Conservation Association, Vanderwell, West Fraser, TC Energy, Environment and Climate Change Canada, Alberta Parks, Tolko Industries Ltd., Forest Improvement Association of Alberta, donors, members and all of our wonderful volunteers!
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2 months ago
The LSLBO and our education partner, the Lesser Slave Forest Education Society are seeking an adventurous, fun and creative individual to join our team this summer! Our summer interpreter will be responsible for leading groups of students on educational fieldtrips, creating new education programs, delivering summer camp programs to children and youth as well as leading tours of the LSLBO. Additional responsibilities include summer interpretive programs at the Boreal Centre for Bird Conservation. For the full job posting please visit our job opportunities page. www.lslbo.org/job-opportunities/summer-interpreter-2/
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