There were a couple of Purple Finches around the site today.
Doesn’t seem that long ago that we started monitoring the Spring migration – but we’re half done!! Yes, 30 days of migration monitoring have flown by (no pun intended). We have banded 686 birds (well ahead of the 547 we did last year or the 489 we did in 2010). But our rate of capture, 17.8 birds per 100 net hours is the 3rd lowest total in 20 years (17.3 in 2014; 12.9 in 2010). We have been able to band on every day although we ran only a few nets or, sometimes, only traps on quite a number of days. There was an unusual pattern to the rate of capture. In most of years we catch more birds as the month progress but this year we sort of went downhill: we averaged 26 birds per day in the 1st 10 days; 25 in the 2nd 10 days; but only 18 in the last 10.
Northern Mockingbirds are seen regularly in the general area but rarely in the banding area.
Our Top 5 in April:
1. American Goldfinch – 117 (nice to see their numbers rebounding)
2. Dark-eyed Junco – 85
3. Brown-headed Cowbird – 69 (this doesn’t augur well for locally breeding birds)
4. Golden-crowned Kinglet – 68
5. Song Sparrow – 55
Part of our job is recording the numbers of all species that we catch or see. So far we have encountered 95 species. So far we have seen 916 Double-crested Cormorants in April. This is well above the average of 290 per year in the past 5 years or 216 in the past 15 years.
Today was another in a long line of “disappointments” – waiting to see signs of the return of long-distance migrants….but to no avail. “Maybe tomorrow” has become our mantra.
Banded 27:
1 Downy Woodpecker
2 Blue Jays
1 White-breasted Nuthatch
2 Ruby-crowned Kinglets (both females)
1 Northern Mockingbird
1 American Tree Sparrow (with a big fat load – a passage bird)
1 Field Sparrow
1 Swamp Sparrow
1 White-throated Sparrow
3 Dark-eyed Juncos
5 Red-winged Blackbirds
1 Brown-headed Cowbird
1 Purple Finch
6 American Goldfinches
Species Count: 51 spp.
Rick