Spring 2020 Banding Season, Week 4: May 4—8

Jeanne O'Rourke | May 14, 2020 |

Northern Rough-winged Swallows will nest in Manomet's bluffs during the summer.

The Landbird Conservation Team

Evan: Monday, May 4—Census

Monday’s weather had the typical chill of an early spring day, but the trees were filled with foreign voices. Over the weekend, a brief puff of warm, southerly air helped usher in a small wave of neotropical migrants to the property. It’s always reassuring to hear the familiar song of the Gray Catbirds around the net lanes. Several other season-firsts included Green Heron, Baltimore and Orchard Orioles, Northern Waterthrush, Ovenbird, American Redstart, and Black-and-white Warblers. Both Veery and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks came from an extremely long distance and are probably a bit out of sync with the stunted leafout from 2020’s cool, wet spring. The forests and field edges at the farm were also buzzing; Wood Thrush and Field Sparrow were singing enthusiastically there. Water was calm on the bay. Under such conditions, the number of visible seabirds is usually low. Although the weather has been warm, no gray treefrogs have taken up residence in our refuge yet.

Net Lanes: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68371791

Holmes Farm: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68375884

Seawatch: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68373530

Catbirds are back!

American Copper

Trailing Arbutus

Male Red-winged Blackbird

TREVOR: WEDNESDAY, MAY 6—BANDING

Despite the warm weather the weekend before, the designated banding day on 6^th May was colder than average, as usual this season. After a warmup from about freezing temps at dawn, it was cheering to hear song from a few Neotropical migrants such as Red-eyed Vireo and Great Crested Flycatcher, but the migrants that appeared in our walk-in traps were overwhelmingly of only one species. Forty-three of the 54 new bandings were White-throated Sparrows with an even mixture of tan and white morph head stripes. Interestingly, we trapped none of the winter flock that had been banded previously – they seemed to have already left to breed north and west of Manomet, predominantly in the boreal spruce and fir forests.

Because we were banding and measuring these birds, we have two advantages over field birders. First, almost all were extremely heavy (up to 30+ grams), and showed clear bulges of yellow subcutaneous fat, as did some birds last week. We could also determine that there were about equal numbers of females this week. Last week was dominated by bigger birds (wing chord 74 or + mm) as males arrived about a week before females. This week there were plenty of birds with female wing measurements of 67mm or less. There is no other way to easily sex whitethroats in the hand, so all with wing lengths from 68-73 mm had to be unknown (at least to us!). During 9 hours, we banded a total of 54 new birds and 10 recaptures – a new species for the season was an irate second calendar year female Red-winged Blackbird who could not resist the bait of cracked corn and millet.

Trevor’s sightings around the property: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68555735

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

Song Sparrow gathering nesting materials

American Beech leafing out

ALAN: FRIDAY, MAY 8—CENSUS

Bright sun and light winds greeted me on my morning census. While the volume of birds was not great, I was pleased to have the songs of various warblers in the background throughout my walk. While most stayed concealed, my first Magnolia Warbler popped up right in front of me next to Lily Pond. As I crept along Stage Point, I peered over the edge and spotted one of the nesting Northern Rough-winged Swallows sitting on its favorite snag (pictured).

My favorite sighting on the farm was seeing several Savannah Sparrows spread out through the rapidly greening grass. For a short window each spring, these birds of open country can be found on the Holmes Farm, betraying their presence with their sweet, high pitched chip note. I ran into Lizzie Schueler, Manomet President around the farmhouse, and as we discussed orioles the perfect thing happened – an Orchard Oriole sang in the distance and a male Baltimore Oriole flew into the gnarled old apple tree in front of us.

Net Lanes: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68608099

Holmes Farm: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68608134

Seawatch: https://ebird.org/checklist/S68608146

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