May 18th – Bringing You Up To Speed | Haldimand Bird Observatory

One of the jewels of the Spring migration: male Blackburnian Warbler. -D. Ward

May 15, Ruthven Park:
When I arrived at the park hoping to open nets, a thunderstorm was rumbling through at five-thirty am with heavy rain. So, we waited, anticipating it would stop soon (checking the radar helped as well). By seven o’clock it had stopped, leaving the air muggy and misty. Even with the heavy cloud cover, we opened all of the nets and we were ready to run and close if we needed to. Thankfully, the rain held off and it was a good day with calm, overcast warm conditions. A steady morning with net checks, extracting birds from each net lane and seeing some beautiful warblers even right up to when we closed six hours later. A record number of five hummingbirds were banded, caught incidentally in the nets. New for the season included Eastern Wood-Pewee and Wilson’s Warbler.

Male Wilson’s Warbler sporting his sporty cap. -KMP

Banded 66:
5 Ruby-throated Hummingbird
1 Hairy Woodpecker
1 Traill’s Flycatcher
1 Least Flycatcher
1 Veery
1 Swainson’s Thrush
5 Gray Catbird
1 Warbling Vireo
2 Blue-winged Warbler
1 Nashville Warbler
13 Yellow Warbler
2 Chestnut-sided Warbler
5 Magnolia Warbler
1 Black-and-White Warbler
2 Common Yellowthroat
1 Wilson’s Warbler
4 Rose-breasted Grosbeak
1 Indigo Bunting
2 Lincoln’s Sparrow
1 Red-winged Blackbird
5 Baltimore Oriole
2 Orchard Oriole
8 American Goldfinch

ET’s: 56 species
Nancy

May 15th, Fern Hill School Oakville:
It was a damp morning with showers forcing us to net “in gaps”. But we persevered and were able to tap into some of the migrants that are beginning to pour through. The most notable was a Gray-cheeked Thrush – the longest flier of the Catharus thrushes, having spent its Winter in South America.

Delight…..over a Baltimore Oriole. -KAP

Banded 33:
1 Mourning Dove
1 Least Flycatcher
2 Swainson’s Thrushes

Bentley with a Swainson’s Thrush he’s just banded. -KAP

1 Gray-cheeked Thrush
2 American Robins
1 Gray Catbird

Male Chestnut-sided Warbler – displaying its name. -KMP

3 Chestnut-sided Warblers
2 Black & White Warblers
2 American Redstarts
1 Northern Cardinal
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks

Jen Pearce showing the right way to hold a “biter” – Rose-breasted Grosbeak. -KAP

1 Chipping Sparrow
9 Red-winged Blackbirds
1 Baltimore Oriole
4 American Goldfinches

ET’s: 53 spp. (including 11 species of warblers)
Rick

May 16th, Ruthven Park:
Beautiful weather day with lots of variety in the area (70 species for ET’s).

Male Ruby-throated Hummingbird (lower) and female above. -KMP

Banded 50:
2 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds
2 Northern Rough-winged Swallows
2 House Wrens
2 Swainson’s Thrushes
1 American Robin
6 Gray Catbirds
1 Yellow-throated Vireo
2 Blue-winged Warblers
2 Tennessee Warblers
7 Yellow Warblers
1 Magnolia Warbler
1 Black-throated Green Warbler
1 American Redstart
1 Common Yellowthroat
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks
1 Indigo Bunting
4 Red-winged Blackbirds
7 Baltimore Orioles
5 American Goldfinches

ET’s: 70 spp.
Rick

Yellow-breasted Chat!! -BGO

May 16th, Lowville Park:
The morning started off slower then most, perhaps all the birds involved in last nights fallout moved on. The fallout was in full extent across the lake, with warblers, videos and flycatchers everywhere you looked. During the first round it was evident there were no lack of birds but they were just not per taking in the dawn chorus. Warblers were common and so were catbirds. The highlight of the day would of been the Sharp Shinned Hawk pulled out of #3 but a Yellow breasted Chat won that award for today. The yellow breasted chat belongs to the warbler family, and is very rare in the Hamilton study area (40km radius from Dundurn castle) with approximately 1-2 records per year.

Banded:31 spp.
Sharp Shinned Hawk-1
Swainson’s Thrush-1
Veery-2
Wood thrush-2
Ruby crowned Kinglet-1
Great crested flycatcher-1
Grey Catbird-11
Tennessee warbler-1
Magnolia warbler-2
Black throated blue warbler-1
American redstart-1
Common yellowthroat-1
Ovenbird-1
Yellow breasted chat-1
White throated sparrow-1
Swamp Sparrow-1
Baltimore Oriole-2
Ben

May 16th, Fern Hill Burlington:

It was nice to back at the school after a week spent away banding at Ruthven. May 16th was a busy banding and birding day, with an ET of 44 species observed throughout the day. We had our first Chimney Swifts, Carolina Wren, Wilson’s Warbler, Nashville Warbler, RB Grosbeaks, Baltimore Orioles, Eastern Kingbird, and Warbling Vireo observed this season. We banded 27 birds including:
2 American Robins
5 Gray Catbirds
1 Chipping Sparrows
1 Eastern White-crowned Sparrow
1 Brown-headed Cowbird
4 Baltimore Orioles
10 American Goldfinches
3 House Sparrows
Katherine

May 17th, Ruthven Park:
A slow beautiful weather day – a good day for sitting on the dock of the bay but not for catching/banding birds. Interestingly American Goldfinches dried up – we didn’t band a single one and had only 2 retraps. They’ve moved on.

Banded 25:
5 Gray Catbirds
1 Blue-winged Warbler
6 Tennessee Warblers
1 Nashville Warbler
3 Yellow Warblers
1 Magnolia Warbler
5 Common Yellowthroats

Female Scarlet Tanager (compare with the female Summer Tanager from previous blog). -DOL

1 Scarlet Tanager
1 Song Sparrow
1 Baltimore Oriole

ET’s: 66 spp.
Rick

May 17th, Fern Hill Burlington:
This was Grandparents’ Day at Fern Hill Burlington, always a fun day filled with curious elders watching their grandchildren display a set of birding and banding skills with pride. We had lower numbers than the previous day but we had a consistent stream of birds that allowed us time to demonstrate the banding process thoroughly. We banded a total of 12 birds including:
1 Least Flycatcher
1 House Wren
2 Gray Catbirds
1 Brown Thrasher
3 Yellow Warblers
3 Baltimore Orioles
1 American Goldfinch
An interesting recapture was a female Yellow Warbler originally banded in 2016 as a SY bird. Janice squeezed in a census in between the activities of the busy day and observed the first Eastern Wood Pewee, Least Flycatcher, Great Crested Flycatcher, Northern Rough-winged Swallow, Cedar Waxwing, and Bay-breasted Warbler of the year.
Katherine

May 18th, Ruthven Park:
There was a NE wind during the night that must have slowed some migrants down as there seemed to be more around this morning. We had a delightful group from a Brantford school – an environmental club made up of students from several grades rather than a single grade. It was a breath of fresh air – all the kids wanted to be here and see what was going on. This gave us the chance to expose some of the older students to actual banding, which made their experience even more meaningful.

Banded 42:
2 Eastern Wood Pewees
1 Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
4 Gray Catbirds
2 Cedar Waxwings
1 Warbling Vireo
6 Tennessee Warblers

A difficult bird to ID at a distance – female Cape May Warbler. -KNP

2 Cape May Warblers
4 Yellow Warblers

First Blackpoll Warbler banded this year – a real long-distance migrant. -DOL

1 Blackpoll Warbler
2 American Redstarts
1 Ovenbird
3 Common Yellowthroats
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks
2 Indigo Buntings
1 Field Sparrow
2 Baltimore Orioles
5 American Goldfinches
1 House Sparrow

ET’s: 69 spp.
Rick
Photo Gallery from the past several days:

Nashville Warbler. -D. Ward

Red-eyed Vireo. They returned somewhat late this year. -D. Ward

Female Yellow Warbler. -D. Ward

Dave Maida…..hard at work. -JDF

Faye brought her class…..and then got to teach them about banding. -JDF

A young (SY) male American Redstart. From a distance it looks like a female but note the black blotches on the face – full adult black plumage just beginning to moult in. This warbler is different than other warblers in that it takes 2 years to attain adult breeding plumage. -KMP