Howdy all,
It was quite the interesting day at the banding station. After the first
three hours, we had only banded four birds. But they are birds that we normally
don't catch many of here at Kiptopeke. We started off the day with an EASTERN
SCREECH OWL! It was only the sixth one since 1994. Also on that netrun we
caught
a LEAST FLYCATCHER. We average 5.4 per season since 1997. The next netrun had
a lone BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER. The average here over the last decade is only
2.4 per season. Then came a PINE WARBLER. Although a common bird to Virginia,
we don't catch many here with a season average of just 4.7 birds a season. So
it was quite an interesting start. Well, the last half of the day was a bit
more normal and surprisingly the numbers picked up. We ended the day banding a
total of 20 birds.
So how about the thunderstorms last night? We got a nice rain out of it here
on the shore, a much needed rain that's for sure. Great light show here!
Still a lot of hummingbirds here at the house. And still all RUBY-THROATED. I
am still hopeful, however!
Here are the totals for 8/20:
American Redstart 2
Pine Warbler 1
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher 1
Least Flycatcher 1
Carolina Chickadee 1
White-eyed Vireo 1
Carolina Wren 2
Northern Cardinal 1
Eastern Screech Owl 1
Northern Mockingbird 9
TOTAL ----------------------------- 20
Cheers,
Jethro Runco
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