Now, I was originally going to title this missive: “We Have A Winner!” But, on thinking it through, I decided this would be self-defeating. You will remember back to the Spring Migration Monitoring period that we had the “Bird Banding Bakeoff”. We had a lot of very delicious entries – to the point that it was becoming impossible to judge between them. So, I suggested that the winner could be the person that turns up with a home-made coconut cream pie. Well yesterday Nancy Furber brought one – to the delight of the whole banding group, and to celebrate my birthday – and, theoretically, could claim the championship. But if I did that then folks might think that the “contest” was over and the baked goodies might peter out. Not a good thing you must admit! So…..Nancy is NOT the winner. In the on-going contest of baking (and life) she has just raised the bar. So keep trying! (And thanks Nancy – it made for a delightful birthday party.)
The pie was one first. The second? We banded the very first Purple Martins that have ever nested at Ruthven. It seems like many years ago now that Linda and Al Thrower put up the 2 large nesting martin boxes and then, as an afterthought, attached a nesting gourd to one of them. And for many years we got no martins. But this year we have at least 10 and, I think (it’s hard to get a ladder up to the boxes) 4 nests. From the start this year the birds seemed to like the gourd and it was from this nest that we banded 4 young ones. In fact, these birds seemed to be many days ahead of the rest of the nests. I wonder what it is about the gourd…….?
What about this heat!? I just returned from a week on Grand Manan Island in the Bay of Fundy where I was banding Nelson’s Sharp-tailed Sparrows (and Savannah Sparrows as “bycatch”) . We had marvellous weather but the day time highs there would have been the night-time temperatures here. So I was feeling it. And then, for some inane reason, I thought it would be a good idea to get out the bush-hog and extend net lane #8 down to the river. So there we were, Chris Harris and I, running this darned thing back and forth across the river flats….in the blazing sun….sweating like fat pigs….Why do humans make the decisions they do, I wonder? I guess it was because, from a banding perspective, it was a slow day and, well, we should be doing something productive….and…I had to “burn off” that pie. Anyway, we have a wonderful long net lane that will sample birds using the river flats below the main banding area. It might be interesting. We will only run it when we have the personpower to do so.
Banded 25:
4 Purple Martins
2 Eastern Tufted Titmice (both HY – “Hatch Year” – birds; i.e., hatched this year)
1 Black-capped Chickadee
4 House Wrens
1 American Robin
1 Gray Catbird
1 Cedar Waxwing
3 Warbling Vireos (an adult female and a HY bird caught in the same net at the same time)
1 Yellow Warbler
3 Northern Cardinals
1 Indigo Bunting
1 Song Sparrow
2 Baltimore Orioles
Retrapped 9:
1 Downy Woodpecker
1 Eastern Tufted Titmouse
1 Black-capped Chickadee
1 American Robin
1 Gray Catbird
1 Yellow Warbler
1 Rose-breasted Grosbeak
1 Song Sparrow
1 Baltimore Oriole
ET’s: 41 spp.
Rick