Thunderstorms moved into the area overnight and opening nets was delayed a little bit while we waited for them to pass. The rest of the day was overcast and drizzly and strong thunderstorms built up again in the afternoon, but we were done with banding by then. Sometimes days like this end up great for banding as it is not as hot as usual and the nets are harder for the birds to see with no sun hitting them. We continue to catch our typical species, but the volume of captures is high for many of them. We have now broken the Black-and-white warbler record of 173 banded in 2008, as we are up to 177 now. So we are closing in on the 2,000 bird of the season but we haven’t broken 50 species yet. We usually catch at least 60 species in other years with over 2,000 captures. We’ll see; there are at least 5 more species that we should capture such as Indigo bunting, Wood thrush, Tennessee warbler, Bay-breasted warbler and Eastern phoebe.
I have to agree with Steffanie that Ovenbirds, although very common and ordinary at our site, they really are quite cute! It’s the big eye (photo by Steffanie Munguia)
Another look at yesterday’s Yellow-throated warbler (photo by Natalie Mahomar)
