Monthly Banding Update

June '07 Report (Gina Barton, Coyote Creek Field Station Manager) - Summer is here - parents are feeding their begging babies, the auditory candy of the birds' songs have tapered off, and some birds are even starting another brood. We have a nesting Cooper's hawk near a set of our nets, which we are reminded of by the "kek kek kek" greeting we receive each morning when we open those nets. In June we saw at least two white fuzzy heads poking out of the nest. We captured 210 birds of 17 species, with 22 birds per 100 net hours. of the birds we captured, we put bands on 104 of them, while 89 were birds we banded previously. We operated nets on 13 days this month, and our banding and field station volunteers donated 299 hours of their time.

In June alone we caught 29 Bewick's Wren, 15 of which were new birds. The number of new Bewick's Wren in June surpasses our total for passed years - we captured 8 new birds in 2006 and 10 new birds in 2005. Bewick's Wren start to learn their songs between 30 and 60 days after hatching, and they learn from neighboring territory holders rather than from their father. The young birds end up singing in local dialect where their territory is established vs. the dialects within the territories they were raised. They are also known to sing in asynchronous bouts with Wrentits in the chaparral of California.

New species for 2007 are Mourning Dove and Western Scrub-jay. Western Scrub-jays, like other species in the family Corvidae, cache their food for later consumption. They will store anything from insects to animal parts to seeds, and will recover the perishable items (insect and animal parts) before the seeds. They use spatial memory, landmarks and a sun compass to retrieve these caches, and can find caches up to 250 days after caching! Can you imagine trying to remember where you put your car keys 250 days later? Young Florida Scrub-jays, a close relative to our Western species and an endemic species to Florida, will help their parents rear the next brood.

Other species of note in June were one juvenile Oregon junco, one adult Black-headed Grosbeak, and three adult Bullock's Orioles. In July, we may start to catch the young Black-headed Grosbeaks and Bullock's Orioles, and if we're even luckier some fledgling Cooper's Hawks! (Information taken from the Bird's of North America Series, Cornell University)