There was a lot more “action” this morning – but not until the sun rose and began to warm things up; even the dawn chorus was late to get started (by about 20 minutes). Early nesting species are feeling the impact of this cold snap. Several days ago, Joanne was excited to report that her very first box of bluebirds had produced 5 young. Yesterday she contacted me again to let me know that all five had succumbed. Christine and Chris, who are monitoring all the Tree Swallow and bluebird boxes on the Ruthven site (and some at Tanquanyah), reported that many of the eggs in these boxes had been ejected or pipped by House Wrens. When there is a prolonged cold snap, both the parent birds have to leave to find food so that they can survive – leaving no one to guard the eggs. It’s a hard time all over.



We had good variety in terms of birding although some of the species were here in only small numbers. Still, the species count of 71 was considerably higher than yesterday’s 59 and indicates that there was some “action”.

A big surprise was the capture of a female Carolina Wren in net 1A (about 30 m from the banding lab). Although Dorothy Smith had reported one about a week ago down by the cemetery, we hadn’t seen or heard any sign of it since. The surprise was that this bird had a well developed brood patch indicating that she had nested and was sitting on eggs….not too far from the lab.

Banded 31:
1 Mourning Dove
1 Blue Jay
1 Carolina Wren
2 Gray Catbirds
1 Blue-winged Warbler
1 Nashville Warbler
3 Yellow Warblers
2 Magnolia Warblers
1 Black-throated Blue Warbler
2 Myrtle Warblers
2 Ovenbirds
2 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks
1 Chipping Sparrow
1 Song Sparrow
2 Eastern White-crowned Sparrows
1 Red-winged Blackbird
4 Brown-headed Cowbirds
1 Baltimore Oriole
2 American Goldfinches

ET’s: 71 spp.