Northwest winds keep birds here

Northwest winds prevailed again lowering our catch to 458 new birds and increasing recaptures to 106. As expected not much movement out of the area occurred with the numbers of new banded decreasing from yesterday and the banded birds remained. I want to say a big “Thank You!” to my great volunteers who have continued to give it their all in this unusual volume spring. They are the best and assist in making this project run efficiently. My hat goes off to all of you!

We have maintained good diversity of warblers with 23 species again captured today with an additional Prothonotary Warbler who is on territory. Highlights for the day include a Kentucky Warbler male, 15 Cape May Warblers and 14 Northern Parulas. This has been a banner year for parulas. In an average year, we catch 9 and we caught 14 in one day! Everything is above average or working its way there. We have been fortunate to get the right weather and winds to bring them here.

Top 8 species:
Magnolia Warbler – 69
American Redstart – 34
Nashville Warbler – 26
Yellow Warbler – 22
Wilson’s Warbler – 21
Tennessee Warbler – 21
Swainson’s Thrush – 19
Chestnut-sided Warbler – 18

Here is the quiz bird for the day! They have been singing up a storm the past couple days! They sound like the cadence of putting your foot down on a sewing machine pedal and it goes real fast at the end.

Two neat features to see on an aerial feeding warbler (Amercian Redstart) (This is not the answer to the quiz bird): a wide beak similar to flycatchers and modifed feathers that look like whiskers called rictal bristals.

It sounds like this coming week is going to be a warm one. There is still time to enjoy the spring migration. Afterall, there is still a male Kirtland’s Warbler around so things are still happening!

Quiz bird is Tennessee Warbler.