Big Day at Erie Bluffs

Yesterday was insanely busy. There had been a huge movement of birds during the night, and as I was setting up nets I could see and hear birds everywhere. On days like these I'd rather be out birding than forced to stay in one place and see what comes my way. But, all in all it's not a bad problem to have.

The birds of the day were the Blue Jays that flew along the lake shore in force. Flocks would settle in the harvested corn field and then fly to the forest edge where 13 of them encountered my nets. If an impending thunderstorm hadn't forced me to close the nets at 11:30, I could probably have doubled that number. Apart from being a handsome species, I really like the way they smell. It's a very distinctive odor, reminding me a little of a pet Jackdaw our family had many years ago.

Among the new arrivals was this Lincoln's Sparrow, a very attractive species.

I also caught several Ovenbirds. This is a North American warbler, and not to be confused with the South American family Furnaridae.

 From certain angles they almost look like Wood Thrushes with their distinct dark spots on a white chest.

 Except of course that Wood Thrushes are much larger.

 I also caught my first White-crowned Sparrow of the year. They're a great bird to band, generally not getting too tangled in the net and much less interested in peeling the skin off your fingers than are the White-throats.

 Speaking of skin peelers, this SY Rose-breasted Grosbeak has the tools to do some serious damage, but isn't as dedicated as are Northern Cardinals, something for which I was very grateful. This bird offered a great illustration on how to age an individual based upon molt limits.

Here you can see that he's molted his innermost flight feathers, the tertials, as well as several of the greater and median coverts. 

 You can see the same pattern on this SY female Rose-breast, although its a bit more subtle.

 Another first of the year was this Northern Mockingbird, a species that's never happy in the net or hand.

 Finally, I photographed this female White-breasted Nuthatch, female because her colors are more subdued than the male's, but also because she had a brood patch and looked like there was an egg almost ready to come out of her.

I had six nets open for a total of three-and-a-half hours each and caught over 60 birds. It was a very busy morning with a nice variety of species. today wasn't as busy but as compensation we caught some unusual species. More on that tomorrow.