It was a brilliant sunrise. The clouds were tinged orange and pink as the sun rose and when it began to clear the horizon it bathed the treetops in reddish gold. Simply stunning.

Similar to the 4th, last night began clear with an almost full moon and then clouded over sometime during the early morning bringing the migrants down to earth. There was excitement along the edges as I went from net to net in the dark to open them – mostly sparrows ‘chipping’ away when I passed and disturbed them. We had a big first round and were just finishing banding them when a large group of children (with their mothers) arrived to take in the experience. For 2 hours I was surrounded or followed by very keen kids who wanted to see everything that was going on. It was a lot of fun. And since we were getting a lot of birds they had lots to see. [It was also good that Nancy Furber, Elaine Serena, Shirley Klement and Christine Madliger showed up to help ‘manage’ the children, extract birds from the nets and band!]

For me the ‘best’ birds of the day were a pair of Orange-crowned Warblers and a Blue-headed Vireo. The Orange-crowns look a bit like a Tennessee but have yellow undertail coverts. I find their subtle colouring very appealing.

Banded 105:
1 Eastern Phoebe
2 Black-capped Chickadees
10 Golden-crowned Kinglets
8 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
1 Eastern Bluebird
2 Hermit Thrushes
2 Gray Catbirds
1 Blue-headed Vireo
2 Orange-crowned Warblers
10 Yellow-rumped Warblers
1 Black & White Warbler
1 Chipping Sparrow
2 Field Sparrows
9 Song Sparrows
1 Lincoln’s Sparrow
1 Swamp Sparrow
25 White-throated Sparrows
2 Eastern White-crowned Sparrows
1 Dark-eyed Junco
23 American Goldfinches

Retrapped 15:
2 Downy Woodpeckers
3 Black-capped Chickadees
1 Golden-crowned Kinglet
1 Gray Catbird
1 Black-throated Green Warbler
1 Song Sparrow
2 White-throated Sparrows
1 Dark-eyed Junco
3 American Goldfinches

ET’s: 42 spp.

Rick