Yellow-rumped (Myrtle) Warblers continue to move through. -P Thoem
It’s been an interesting (and busy) three days. On all three days we’ve had large numbers of starlings, robins, blackbirds (red-wings and rusty), grackles, and waxwings whirling around the site. It’s interesting to watch a flock of a 1,000 starlings “hit” a clump of dogwood. In a frenzy they strip every berry from the bushes and then pour back into the sky, moving on to the next clump of shrubbery. The other species are a little less frenetic but, all the same, are making a big dent in the wild grape clusters (although I think we have so many grapes that there will be many clusters long after the migration has ended, providing food for wintering birds).
Eastern Bluebirds have been seen every day through the Fall. -P. Thoem
But the 21st was different. There was a certain urgency that was almost palpable. A change in the weather was coming and the birds needed to feed to build or at least maintain the reservoirs that would sustain them through the storm to come. They seemed driven. They began to descend from the treetops to get at the grape clusters closer to the ground….and within range of the nets. We caught birds in good numbers throughout the early part of the day but then I got a double whammy: big “hits” in nets 6 and 9. Hard work…but very fulfilling. For a couple of hours it was “ring and fling”: band the bird, determine its age and sex, but no morphometrics before releasing it. When the dust settled we had banded 236 birds, 179 of them were Cedar Waxwings! A momentous day indeed!
Canda Geese will be happy when the hunting season is over. -P. Thoem
Today (the 22nd) was interesting in that a Common Raven flew over the banding lab, heading east. These birds are beginning to move (back?) into southern Ontario. Our Cedar Waxwing banding total now sits at a whopping 1,083. It’s fairly easy to tell when wild grapes made themselves known at Ruthven. From 1996 to 2009 we averaged 45 waxwings per season. From 2010 to 2012 we have averaged 570! (And this average will be even higher now.)
October 20th: Banded 63:
7 Golden-crowned Kinglets
5 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
3 American Robins
28 Cedar Waxwings
3 Myrtle Warblers
2 Chipping Sparrows
1 Field Sparrow
7 Song Sparrows
3 White-throated Sparrows
2 Dark-eyed Juncos
2 American Godlfinches
ET’s: 39 spp.
October 21st: Banded 236:
1 Winter Wren
5 Golden-crowned Kinglets
8 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
5 Hermit Thrushes
12 American Robins
179 Cedar Waxwings
11 Myrtle Warblers
2 Song Sparrows
1 Swamp Sparrow
9 White-throated Sparrows
2 Dark-eyed Juncos
1 Red-winged Blackbird
ET’s: 34 spp.
October 22nd: Banded 56:
2 Golden-crowned Kinglets
3 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
5 Hermit Thrushes
6 American Robins
24 Cedar Waxwings
7 Myrtle Warblers
2 Song Sparrows
2 White-throated Sparrows
1 Eastern White-crowned Sparrow
1 Dark-eyed Junco
1 Common Grackle
2 American Goldfinches.
ET’s: 37 spp.
Rick