Week 5: At L(e)ast, a Banding Tick!

An absolutely adoooorable Least Flycatcher! (David Bell)

    The end of August is when better turnover of migrating songbirds occurs, a time when we start to see and catch more! We expect this uptick in activity as we approach the fall months and it’s always pleasant to see when the passerines start flowing! 

    Numbers are beginning to increase for us, and fall is definitely in the air. Both of our stations are catching more birds each day compared to previous weeks, and daily species + individual totals are on the rise. Total number of new birds banded this week at Rocky Point was 204 (vs 183 the week before), and at Pedder Bay we banded 206 new birds (vs 110 the week before).

    Vireo and Flycatcher counts are gradually on the climb, and as for Warbler numbers, they are skyrocketing! The presence of Yellow Warblers is very evident right now. This week we’ve been recording anywhere from 20 individuals, all the way up to 75 individuals at both stations on daily estimated totals. Compare this to last week when we were only seeing ~3-10 individuals. Yellow Warblers are not the only Parulidae increasing at both sites; daily counts of individual Orange-crowned Warblers, Townsend’s Warblers, and (my personal favourite) Black-throated Grey Warblers are steadily rising too as fall progresses. We caught our first Townsend’s Warblers of the season (two) at Pedder Bay this week! 

What a gorgeous Townsend's Warbler! - 1 of 2 caught (Samuelle SP)

   With this increase of passerine activity comes the prospect of finding a rare songbird or two. Usually these rare songbirds are encountered around the stations (either at Rocky Point or Pedder Bay), but occasionally we get lucky and find a rarity in one of our mist nets. 

    This week at our Rocky Point station we got our first taste of interior-rarity-action when we banded a Hatch-Year Least Flycatcher! This tiny, subtly plumaged, Empidonax species is a common summer breeder across the vast majority of Canada and parts of the United States, but is rarely found along the western edge of BC. On August 23rd, when we caught it, we actually observed two other individuals (so at L E A S T three individuals were around the station that day). Two were hanging around the nets and eventually one ended up hawking itself right into the upper section of net 8, giving RPBO it’s 4th (ever!) banding record of this species. This was a long awaited banding tick for one of our interns (Liam), who up until then, had not gotten to band any new species. A well deserving species to get for his first banding tick of the season!

One more photo of the Least Flycatcher (Liam Singh)

    Another species we caught that's not quite as rare as the Least Flycatcher but still equally as thrilling to band, was a Northern Waterthrush! We caught this bird at our Pedder Bay station and it represents only the 6th banding record for Pedder Bay (total between both sites is 29).

Northern Waterthrush (David Bell)

    Also at the Rocky Point station, we caught another exciting species, a Marsh Wren! Like the Northern Waterthrush, we typically catch one a year.

Lil' baby Marsh Wren looking cute as ever (Liam Singh)

*Rocky Point station: (RP)

*Pedder Bay station: (PB)

Other birds of interest we have banded this week between the two stations included: 

A Black-throated Grey Warbler (RP), 

Our second Cooper’s Hawk of the season (PB), 

Two Hammond’s Flycatchers (PB), 

Another Barn Swallow was caught (PB), 

Two Red-breasted Sapsuckers (RP)

Nine Western Tanagers (PB)

Black-throated Grey Warbler (Liam Singh)

Check out those headlights! (Liam Singh)

A young Barn Swallow (Rebecca Golat)

Red-breasted Sapsucker (Liam Singh)

Western Tanager (Liam Singh)

Weekly stats for both stations can be seen here:

 

Week 4: Return of the King(fisher)

 

Red-breasted Nuthatch   photo credit: David Bell

So…. Week 4! 

     Although mid August is a relatively slow time for migration, we’ve had an awesome week! It started off with a beautiful hatch year female Belted Kingfisher on Thursday August 12th at Pedder, a very long-awaited banding tick for me. This was our third Belted Kingfisher for the year!

Belted Kingfisher   photo credit: David Bell

     Last weekend we had our first notable wildfire smoke for the season, which is unfortunately becoming a yearly (or multiple times yearly) occurrence. Visibility was fairly poor at times, and led to some interesting sunrises that are becoming all too familiar.

Smoky morning   photo credit: David Bell

     As fall migration slowly starts up, we’ve also been catching a couple interesting subspecies that are starting to pass through! We had our first of the year "Grey-headed" Orange-crowned Warbler and "Olive-backed" Swainson’s Thrush which don’t usually spend the breeding season here, so it’s a sign that birds are moving south.

"Grey-headed" Orange-crowned Warbler    photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

Black-throated Grey Warbler (our logo bird!)   photo credit: David Bell

Pacific Wren, one of my favourite birds to band!   photo credit: Liam Singh

     Our awesome Bander in Charge Dave was rewarded on Tuesday August 17th with a hilarious young Pileated Woodpecker, the second we’ve caught this year and a much-wanted banding tick for him! This is a bird that many banders dream of getting the chance to band, so we’ve been extremely lucky this year to catch two.

Pileated Woodpecker   photo credit: David Bell

     One part of banding that I absolutely love is getting recaptures from previous years. I’d like to give a little shoutout to this gorgeous adult "Puget Sound" White-crowned Sparrow, who was banded as an After Hatch Year in 2017! That means this bird at least 5 years old! Good luck on your migration this year little PSWS💗

"Puget Sound" White-crowned Sparrow    photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

    There have been some interesting observations recently at both stations this week!

        Pedder:

• First Hammond's Flycatcher of the year

• Sora nighttime flyover just before banding started

• A visitor photographed two Lazuli Buntings while visiting! 

       Rocky:

• Highlights: Nashville Warbler, Least Flycatcher, Brown Pelicans, Common Tern, American Golden-Plover

• First for the year: Sooty Shearwater, Pectoral Sandpiper, Bonaparte's Gull, Baird's Sandpiper

• First 100 species day! (Daily Estimated Totals- combining banding, census and observations)

Least Flycatcher    photo credit: David Bell

    Apart from birds, this week we have been treated to some cool invertebrates! 

Chlorochroa sp.     photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

Morning-glory Prominent    photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

Robust Lancetooth Snail     photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

Lion Beetle in a net (unbanded☺)    photo credit: Liam Singh 

Greater Night-stalking Tiger Beetle    photo credit: Rebecca Reader-Lee

Here are our station stats for the week:

Week 3: Big Pic(idae) Energy

Our elder senior bander, RG, birding on top of the Pedder Bay hill (Samuelle SP).

It's hard to believe that three weeks of fall migration banding have FLOWN by already! As a new member to the RPBO community, I am having a blast working with the many amazing volunteers and my awesome coworkers. I'd like to thank all the volunteers for their hard work every day - you all make our jobs as banders so much more fun and interesting every day! We have also had the joy of hosting more visitors this week! One of the best parts of our jobs is teaching volunteers and visitors about the amazing work we do, and we love the enthusiasm and curiosity from inquisitive minds that drop by! If you are interested in visiting our Pedder Bay station, you can sign up as a visitor on our Eventbrite site, here!

Our intern Liam showing his little brother how to hold a bird (Emma RL). 

If you're an avid birder or bird bander, you will be well acquainted with the "August doldrums." If you aren't familiar with this term, basically August is often quite slow and quiet for the birds in the nets and around the station. Birds are not singing as actively as they were even two weeks ago, but the slower banding days offers us an opportunity to further appreciate what DOES make its way into our nets and our surrounding habitat. 

Despite the lower numbers of birds this week, there is never a dull moment at the Rocky Point Bird Observatory. With a few spare minutes hours here and there, the banders, interns, and volunteers have been keeping themselves busy busy busy fixing nets, building new stairs (at Pedder Bay - thank you Mark Byrne!), decorating the banding board, and teaching new volunteers. 

The interns added some art to the Rocky Point banding board. I will leave it up to you to figure out which were done by Liam and which by Rebecca RL (Samuelle SP).

So what were our highlight birds this week??!? The August doldrums could not stop biodiversity this week, that's for sure! We had some pretty darn sweet and spicy treats, offering views like no other of birds many people DREAM about. Week three ended with a BANG with a Cassin's Vireo at Rocky Point. This being the follow up act to the epic double trouble day on Monday when not only a Western Wood-Peewee was caught at Rocky Point, but a Pileated Woodpecker was caught only minutes later at Pedder Bay! We don't often catch these three species, and getting the opportunity to see them up close is a real privilege and a great fortune!

A stunning Cassin's Vireo. A creature of ENVY (David Bell). 

A GORGEOUS Western Wood-Peewee looking REGAL (David Bell). 

A lively Pileated Woodpecker showing off his underwing and somewhat crazy eyes (Samuelle SP).

This week also offered us lots of blackberries, some rain on Saturday, fallen trees blocking the road into Rocky Point on Sunday, and amphibians!! As usual, many deer hanging out around the stations - friendly banding friends... as long as they stay away from our nets! There are always lots of things going on to keep us on our toes out here! 

A Rough-skinned Newt at Rocky Point (Samuelle SP). 

Check out our daily and season totals below! While Rocky Point continues to lead for total number of birds banded, Pedder is squeaking in with a better species diversity for new birds banded. Stay tuned for next week's update! Any guesses for what the next fun surprise in the nets will be??

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Week 2: Quiz Time

Rufous Hummingbird-David Bell

The weeks are flying by at RPBO. Week 2 has been a perfect time for quizzing the interns and not a day goes by without learning something new. 

Are you a scribe at RPBO? Have you been wondering why the dedicated banders may take an extra few minutes banding a bird you have seen a hundred times? Well, this season we have added the WRP (Wolfe-Ryder-Pyle) code to our data collection. WRP is an alternative aging system based on molt cycles instead of the calendar year, and uses three-letter codes to define the plumage and molt cycle of the bird. At RPBO, we have historically used the calendar aging system (e.g. Hatch-Year and After-Hatch-Year) to age our birds during migration. This system works well when the individual is from a temperate region where there is generally one well-defined breeding season (i.e. spring/summer). If the bird breeds in a tropical region, where breeding seasons are not well defined, then the WRP aging system comes into play and is more useful than calendar year. Combining these two systems provides the most accurate means of categorizing age. Thanks for bearing with us while we learn these codes!

Now a quiz for you. Who are these two birds?

Rocky is on pace for a record high, with the season total of 542 beating last year’s record high of 517 as of the end of week two (average is 406). 220 new birds were banded there this week, above the average of 194 for the second week of migration.

Highlights this week include the first Downy Woodpecker for the season, along with a Hairy Woodpecker and a Northern Flicker. Now we are just waiting on that Pileated Woodpecker (fingers crossed)! Hints of fall migration are appearing with more Willow Flycatchers, MacGillivray’s Warblers, and a whopping 63 Wilson’s Warblers in the nets. Observation highlights include the first Wandering Tattler, Short-eared Owl, Short-billed Dowitcher and Common Nighthawk of the season. Seawatch opportunities have been almost non-existent due to fog in the early morning and heat haze later in the morning.

Another quiz...

Pedder, despite having a slow week of 145 new birds (average 185 for the second week), had the highlight bird of the week, a Cooper’s Hawk. Rebecca Reader-Lee got the banding tick for the hatch-year male bird. The banders at Pedder had their hands full this week with lots of hummingbirds; 13 Anna’s and 11 Rufous. Observation highlights include the seasons first Barred Owl, Lesser Yellowlegs, and Cassin’s Vireo.

Rebecca RL with the Cooper's Hawk-David Bell

Did you know we have a "tarantuloid" - a related type of tarantula here on Vancouver Island ?

The banders and volunteers at Pedder are becoming familiar with the Pacific folding trap-door Spider, Antrodiaetus pacificus . These arachnids are harmless and docile as shown here by bander Sam facing her fears. 

Always handle with care as these
spiders can live up to 20 years old!-Rebecca Golat

Antrodiaetus pacificus-Samuelle Simard-Provençal

As always a huge thank you to our amazing volunteers.  We had some new faces around the banding station and we were happy to teach what bird banding is all about! If you are interested in signing up to volunteer please apply here: 

RPBO Volunteer Application Form

We are happy to have visitors this season and if you would like to visit the station please sign up here:

Pedder Bay Banding Station visits

Quiz Answers: Photo 1- House Wren (left), Bewick's Wren (right)

                         Photo 1- Hairy Woodpecker (left), Downy Woodpecker (right)