Red sky in the morning sailors (read: banders) take warning. A gorgeous pink suffusion covered the whole eastern sky just after I opened the nets – well worth the light rains and showers that it presaged.
There was not a lot of ‘new’ activity around the site except perhaps for American Goldfinches that continue to show up in large numbers at the feeders and another Eastern Towhee that managed to avoid all of the nets as it sang and danced its way from net lane #10 to the area behind #6.
Seven Common Loons went over – spread out over about an hour. All were headed north or northwest.
Banded 39:
1 Mourning Dove
1 Blue Jay
1 Ruby-crowned Kinglet
1 Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
1 American Robin
1 Brown Thrasher
1 European Starling
4 Chipping Sparrows
1 Field Sparrow
1 Song Sparrow
3 White-throated Sparrows
1 Red-winged Blackbird
22 American Goldfinches
Retrapped 17:
1 Downy Woodpecker
1 Chipping Sparrow
2 Song Sparrow
1 Brown-headed Cowbird
12 American Goldfinches
Many of the goldfinches that we handled today were older ASY birds – as if an ‘older cohort’ moved in. Most of the retraps were not recently banded birds-most were from at least last year and some were older than that.
Estimated Totals: 37 species
Rick