Bird Conservancy of the Rockies - Barr Banding Report, October 11

[meredith]

The wind held off just long enough for us to get in a nice final morning of banding and sharing birds with our last visitors.  We had one rare-ish for the station and new for the season species - a hatch year Swamp Sparrow - and one rare-ish late warbler - an Ovenbird.  And lots more Ruby-crowned Kinglets (a big year for them).  Here's the breakdown of the final 31 birds:

Ruby-crowned Kinglet 9

Hermit Thrush 1

Brown Thrasher 1

Orange-crowned Warbler 2

Ovenbird 1

Spotted Towhee 1

Song Sparrow 3

Lincoln's Sparrow 3

Swamp Sparrow 1

Gambel's White-crowned Sparrow 6

Dark-eyed Junco, Slate-colored 1

Dark-eyed Junco, Pink-sided 1

Dark-eyed Junco, unidentified 1

It was really a great season for us - busy with birds and lots of enthusiasm from staff, volunteers and visitors, all of whom were happy to be outside learning about birds and enjoying nature in what we all know has been a difficult and different year.  

It will take me some time to get the data compiled and analyzed, but we had one of our best years - several species migrated through in very high numbers, local breeders appear to have done very well, and the number of species was also high.

Thanks to everyone who e-mailed comments during the season; it is a pleasure to share our work with all of you!

I'll post information about our season-end report when it is available.  

Meredith McBurney

Bander, Barr Lake Station

Bird Conservancy of the Rockies