Thursday, March 17, 2011

March 16, 17 - Winter Songbird Monitoring

Our Winter Songbird Monitoring program has finally come to a close, and it has been an exciting and amazingly successful pilot season. In total we banded 279 birds and recaptured 361 birds of 23 species. A full report will be coming shortly.

All of the winter residents are still around, but over these last two days of monitoring we have have been seeing and banding our first definite spring migrants. We originally defined mid-March as being the end point for our winter monitoring program and it seems to be well chosen. The winter residents will likely stay until mid to late-April. We will still continue monitoring these birds through re-sighting colour-banded birds and through birds detected during our Spring Monitoring Monitoring program.

It has been difficult to predict where the birds may be focusing their activity, but the area between the west side of the woodlot to the wetland has seen most of it lately. Part of this has been the kinglets, chickadees, and warblers using the willows which are starting to bud-out now. But even most of the sparrows have been in this area, feeding largely on the new shoots of grasses and other small plants. Spotted Towhees are also now on territory, and males are frequently seen on the tops of shrubs singing heartily, which has made re-sighting colour-banded birds a lot easier.


It is difficult to choose the favourite banded birds of the period, as the new spring migrants are nice to see again, but we have also had some interesting recaptures as well.


Two alternate plumaged male Audubon's Warblers (one on each day) were certainly a treat to see in the hand after a winter of mostly sparrows. There have been a few Audubon's and Myrtle Warblers around the banding area all winter. These were still in basic plumage when they were last seen, and the few that were caught had not started their spring pre-alternate molt. So these birds were true spring migrants. Another sure sign of spring was the first Rufous Hummingbird of the year on the 17th, an after second-year female, and a male was also heard on the same day. Marsh Wrens have been found at Iona Island all winter, but they always appeared to be few and far between, with only banded one up until the 16/17th. However, we have now banded six, all spring migrants, over the last two days. Several Golden and Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Song Sparrows, Fox Sparrows and Spotted Towhees were also banded recently, but it's difficult to say how many of these are spring migrants versus winter residents.


The recapture highlight from this period was a female Red-shafted Flicker that was originally banded on Dec 13, 2010. Also we managed to catch several Spotted Towhees, Song and Fox Sparrows that were originally banded in November, but have not been seen since. It is interesting that a number of them waited until mid-March to show up again. Perhaps they are starting to become restless before migration and are moving around Iona Island a bit more.


Other birds of note seen around Iona Island included 10-20 Violet-green Swallows, two male Tree Swallows fighting over a nest-box (a sure sign of spring!), at least three Virginia Rails calling from the wetland ponds, the wintering American Bittern, and a few Canvasback.

This concludes our Winter Songbird Monitoring season, a big thank you goes out to all of our volunteers! Stay tuned for updates from our Spring Migration Monitoring program starting on March 25. If you are interested in volunteering, send an email to ionaislandbirds@gmail.com.

Monday, March 7, 2011

March 4 & 7, 2011 - Winter Songbird Monitoring

As our Winter Songbird Monitoring program is nearing the end, the first migrants are beginning to arrive. The weather over the last month has been colder than normal, and the arrival of the earliest migrants, Tree and Violet-green Swallows and Rufous Hummingbirds are about a week or two behind. While monitoring on March 4 did not yield any clear-cut migrants, March 7th had the first Violet-green and Tree Swallows of the season flying around the outer ponds. A few other early migrants were also present, including several species of waterfowl, Killdeer, Golden-crowned Kinglets, Spotted Towhees and Song Sparrows. These are the first trickle of migrants, likely to start increasing later on this month. Willow buds have started opening up and with the warmer temperatures predicted over the next few days it is likely that leaf out will start. Also, get out your hummingbird feeders! With Rufous Hummingbirds present up to the Columbia River it is likely that in less than a week we'll be seeing them back in southwestern BC.


Banding on the 4th appeared spring-like with three Myrtle Warblers caught, although two were the birds caught in recent weeks. Another one of the Golden-crowned Sparrows wintering around the woodlot was captured and colour-banded with all yellow bands.

There also were three interesting sparrow recaptures in the last two days of monitoring, a Song Sparrow banded last April, a Lincoln's Sparrow banded last May and a Spotted Towhee banded last June. The interesting part is where these birds may have gone in the time between banding and recapture. The Song Sparrow and Spotted Towhees were both males with cloacal protuberances, indicating they were breeding locally. So these birds had likely setup territories near the banding area, and may have been roaming about recently getting ready to setup territories for this year. The Lincoln's Sparrow was a bit more interesting. It was originally banded on May 4, 2010 and was thought to be a migrant due to its high levels of fat and its capture during the height of their migration. Recatching it in early March means it has likely spent the winter here, as this is about a month before migration starts. But it raises the possibility that the bird may have been a lingering winter resident, as winter residents have greater site fidelity than migrants. Birds like this make our work interesting and make you rethink about how birds may be using the area.