Another light East wind today made our catch slow again with 53 new birds and 9 recaptures totaling eighteen bird species. Seven warbler species were netted (Black-throated Blue, American Redstart, Magnolia, Bay-breasted, Common Yellowthroat, Blackpoll, and Ovenbird). A highlight for the day was a female Scarlet Tanager. A male was also seen on site as well. A Yellow-bellied Flycatcher, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, and Winter Wren were other specialties for the day.
Top 4 species and number banded:
Swainson’s Thrush - 11
Gray Catbird - 10
Gray-cheeked Thrush -9
Blackpoll Warbler -6
There is still a lot to see this season so get out and enjoy!
Today is a great day for quizzes. Here is a Black and White Warbler we captured today. Can you tell me the age and sex of this bird?
P.S. Black-and-white Warbler is a Hatching Year Male—gray face with distinct black stripes on the flanks. Females have blurry streaks on the flanks. Adult males have black cheek patches with distinct black striping on flanks.
Species and Number Banded
Species and Number Banded
Hatching year Red-eyed Vireos may fool you with their dark eye. Never fear! It will turn red by spring. 
Here is a hatching year male Black-throated Green Warbler:
We did add a new species for the fall: Bay-breasted Warbler. I would ask you to study the picture because it may come back as a quiz bird at a later date. As my volunteers know I am the Quiz Queen. They may have other names for me I suppose. It keeps them on their toes. The other highlight for the day was a hatching year Ruby-throated hummingbird with its streaked throat. I saw one earlier this morning trying to find nectar from any flower it could. It has been so dry the plants are drying up. This is a good reason to plant and water nectar flowers for the migrating hummingbirds. 
One of the attractive warblers in fall is the Chestnut-sided Warbler. Their basic plumage is quite beautiful or handsome depending on what sex it is. Even if you cannot see any chestnut on its sides see if you can see the upper tail coverts. The males will have very distinct black centers to the upper tail coverts. You are already gazing at the bird to identify it, why not see if you can tell what sex it is? Challenge yourself!
You can actually tell by just looking at the heads of these birds. First look at the beak color. An adult Baltimore will have a slate gray bill with the upper mandible being slightly darker than the lower. The bill looks that way on an adult male too but who looks at the bill with the brightly colored black and orange bird? The immatures have a lower mandible that is not gray but flesh to pinkish color more so towards the base of the bill. The bill has not matured or reached its hardened state. By spring the bill will not be a characteristic to use for aging but it works in the fall at this time and latitude. This bill coloration difference occurs in many if not most of immatures of the same species. It is very apparent with adult and immatures of Yellow Warblers. Okay back to these pictures. The immature pictures you will see some black coming in on the face of one. That bird you can sex as male. The other one has to go as unknown at this time. I always make notes because there are some that I really think could be females because of their pale coloration even at this date. A few of these birds will return to this site next spring and can be compared with my notes and what the bird is in its alternate plumage. Unfortunately not many come back to this same exact location for much of a sample size to amount to anything but anecdotal information. Wing chord length does not help because of the great overlap in measurements of both sexes. 
We have caught a couple immature Yellow-shafted flickers (Northern Flicker). One we captured had its prebasic breast feathers growing in. Notice the juvenile feathers are loose textured and the newly growing ones are more structured. 
An unusual catch was a Mourning Dove. They may fly into the net but the small mesh size keeps them from getting caught. The net mesh size is 30 mm which is for warbler sized birds. This dove was an adult female. It has obvious molt limit (last year’s feathers or more than one generation of feathers) and no iridescence on the head.
P.S. Black and White Warbler is a Hatching Year Male—gray face with distinct black stripes on the flanks. Females have blurry streaks on the flanks. Adult males have black cheek patches with distinct black striping on flanks.
