It’s been a strange week, meteorologically speaking: daytime temperatures in the mid- to high-20’s; cloudless skies, and almost no wind. Summer conditions. I’m looking forward to the Fall with its cooler temperatures and flushes of migrants. The only thing that even hints of Fall at the moment is the falling of leaves. The black walnuts are dropping their foliage. It has a rather peaceful effect actually. Sitting their, scanning the upper branches for migrants, the regularly falling leaves seem like a gentle snowfall. In some ways the lack of wind at this time of year is a good thing as most of these falling leaves miss the nets. When the wind blows they fill up and it can take a lot of time and dexterity to remove them at closing time. [BTW the leaf extraction record is help by Elaine Serena and myself when it took us an hour and a half to clear a double net of walnut leaves in order to close it.]

Birds seem to arrive (and then leave) in pulses; some days are better than others both in terms of numbers banded and in the number of species observed. In the latter regard, we have seen VERY few warblers and other migrants but on Saturday (14th) we encountered 46 species including 9 firsts (for us) for the season: Pied-billed Grebe, Philadelphia Vireo, Veery, Swainson’s Thrush, Gray-cheeked Thrush, Bay-breasted Warbler, Blackburnian Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, Wilson’s Warbler. Alas, except for the Wilson’s Warbler which we caught, the other warblers were feeding high in the willows.

Following are our totals for the week. Note the up’s and down’s….
September 10th; Banded 28:
2 Red-eyed Vireos
1 House Wren
2 Marsh Wrens
2 Gray Catbirds
1 Cedar Waxwing
4 Song Sparrows
1 Swamp Sparrow
1 Bobolink
1 Tennessee Warbler
6 Common Yellowthroats
1 Magnolia Warbler
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks
4 Indigo Buntings
ET’s: 35 spp.

September 11th; Banded 17:
1 Eastern Phoebe
1 Red-eyed Vireo
1 House Wren
1 Brown Thrasher
3 Song Sparrows
1 Lincoln’s Sparrow
1 Savannah Sparrow
4 Bobolinks
1 Common Yellowthroat
2 Northern Cardinals
1 Indigo Bunting
ET’s: 28 spp.

September 13th; Banded 10:
1 Downy Woodpecker
2 Song Sparrows
2 Lincoln’s Sparrows
2 Bobolinks
1 Common Yellowthroat
1 Rose-breasted Grosbeak
1 Indigo Bunting
ET’s: 28 spp.

September 14th: Banded 20:
1 American Goldfinch
5 Song Sparrows
1 Lincoln’s Sparrow
2 Swamp Sparrow
1 Savannah Sparrow
1 Bobolink
2 Common Yellowthroats
1 Wilson’s Warbler
1 Rose-breasted Grosbeak
5 Indigo Buntings
ET’s: 46 spp.

September 15th; Banded 12:
5 Gray Catbirds
2 Song Sparrows
1 Lincoln’s Sparrow
3 Common Yellowthroats
1 Indigo Bunting
ET’s: 38 spp.

September 16th; Banded 9:
1 Gray Catbird
1 American Goldfinch
4 Song Sparrows
1 Lincoln’s Sparrows
1 Ovenbird

1 Indigo Bunting
ET’s: 22 spp.

We are getting a fair number of “retraps” – birds that we’ve usually just banded over the last couple of weeks and that are staying around. Most are young of the year that are going through a moult while they also check out the possibilities of the area for potential nesting territories next Spring. The weather is such that they don’t seem to feel much urgency to hurry south…and there’s lots of food here. Today, for example, while we banded only 9 birds, we handled 19 retraps.

Rick