Week 10: Towhee Tuesday Never Ends!

 

22-28 September 2025

With a warm late September air we're commonly seeing foggy days at the stations with a few late summer migrants lingering before they head south like Northern House Wren and Northern Yellow Warbler while seabird numbers and winter residents are on the increase. This week in particular our most abundant bird in the nets was the Spotted Towhee! 

A glassy morning at Rocky Point. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

A foggy morning at Pedder Bay. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

A Spotted Towhee that showed up Tuesday night during owl monitoring to continue the ongoing Towhee Tuesday. (photo Max Hellicar)

Banding

This week the team at Pedder Bay processed 221 new birds and 68 recaptures.

The top 5 most banded species for this week there were:

Hermit Thrush - 34

Fox Sparrow - 25

Song Sparrow - 24

Spotted Towhee – 23

Dark-eyed Junco (Oregon) -20

Many Steller's Jays have been patrolling Pedder Bay noisily flying around collecting acorns. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

A Yellow-shafted Northern Flicker the subspecies normally found in the boreal and eastern parts of North America. Typically in the Capital Region we get Red-shafted Northern Flickers and occasionally Red-shafted x Yellow-shafted intergrades. (photo Gaelin Armstrong)

The Yellow-rumped Warblers have started moving in numbers now with this Myrtle Warbler visiting the nets. Myrtle Warblers differentiate from Audubon's Warbler from the mask, slight supercilium, wing bars, extent of white in the tail and throat patch shape in addition to the white or yellow throat. (photo Andrew Jacobs) 

An Orange-crowned Warbler of the lutescens subspecies, this subspecies is all yellow and breeds in the Capital region. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

A California Quail is a bird we occasionally catch that is not part of the banding project so we can look at their fancy head plumes then let them go on their way. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

Season to date banding totals for Pedder Bay

This week the team at Rocky Point new processed 372 new birds and 76 recaptures.

The top 5 most banded species for this week there were:

Spotted Towhee – 122

Ruby-crowned Kinglet - 23

White-crowned Sparrow (Puget Sound) -22

Pacific Wren – 19

Song Sparrow and Orange-crowned Warbler with a tied - 15

A Swamp Sparrow which come in small numbers in winter to the Capital Region to wet places like the front pond at Rocky Point. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

 A hatch year Cedar Waxwing showing greyer streaked plumage while not yet having any of the namesake waxy tips yet. (photo Andrew Jacobs) 

An Orange-crowned Warbler of the orestera subspecies, this is the interior breeding grey headed variety that we see here on migration. (photo Andrew Jacobs) 

Season to date banding totals for Rocky Point

In the field

At Pedder Bay 

The autumn birds have been picking up with increases in numbers of sparrow flocks, Cackling Goose, Greater White-Fronted Goose, American Robins, Hermit Thrushes, Varied Thrushes, Steller's Jays and Ruby-crowned Kinglets all on the increase while most warblers, vireos and flycatchers have migrated out. Rare birds at Pedder Bay have included Clay-coloured Sparrow and a Western Gull which are quite infrequent at the site.

A Clay-coloured Sparrow on the fire road at Pedder Bay, this has been a good year for encountering this rare species of sparrow at the stations. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

Our local wintering sparrow flocks including birds like this Dark-eyed Junco at Pedder Bay have been on the increase this week. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

At Rocky Point

The migrants have been moving at Rocky Point with Cackling Goose, Greater White-Fronted Goose, Sandhill Crane, Marsh Wren, Many American Robins and Steller's Jays. Late season warblers like Orange-crowned Warbler and Yellow-rumped Warbler are still around in fairly good numbers while most other warblers, vireos and flycatchers are rapidly clearing the area to leave on migration. In the seabird department large rafts of Common Murre and California Gull continue along the seaboard and some less common species like Western Gull, Iceland Gull, Ring-billed Gull. The Shearwater influx continues offshore with both Short-tailed and Sooty Shearwaters. Rarities this week included another Western Palm Warbler and a Franklin's Gull.

A set of first cycle gulls on the rocks in the bay at Rocky Point with Olympic Gull (Glaucous-winged x Western hybrid) left, Western Gull middle and Glaucous-winged Gull right. (photo Andrew Jacobs)

Pedder Bay received a new set of stairs by net 14 courtesy of Mark Byrne!