Saw-whet Owl Banding!

Most birds, and most people, are diurnal (or crepuscular, if you want to be precise). Therefore, most birding takes place during the day. So if I am birding in the middle of the night, chances are there has to be some pretty good birding to drag me out of bed, and many of my best birding experiences (like watching migration from the Empire State Building) have been at night. Last night was one such time.

I went to the campus of Westchester Community College to watch researchers there band Northern Saw-whet Owls, the smallest (and, probably as a result, the cutest) owl in the Eastern US.

Benjamin Van Doren and I arrived at the nets at 7, and after helping Drew and Trudy (the people doing the banding) untangling the leaves that the strong wind had blown into the nets, we headed back to the Owl House, a small building on campus used as a warm location to band the owls and to wait.

With Drew and two other visitors, we located an owl that they had put a radio transmitter on the previous night. Following the beeps, we figured out generally where it was, but since it was on private property, we did not actually see it.

The nets are checked every hour, so at 8:30 we went out for the first time. The high winds were a concern, but otherwise the weather seemed fairly good for owl banding. In the first net we checked, there was an owl! That was easy. The other three nets were empty, so they carefully removed the owl from the net and we headed back to the Owl House to band it. On the way back, we ran into the people who live near the banding site, who seemed a bit annoyed at the audio that was played all night, but were very impressed with the owl.

To be able to see such an amazing bird at such close range was awesome. Trudy measured the owl, which was female, like the majority of the birds they band. It was also born this past spring- a hatch year bird. Though to me it looked identical to an adult, the key is that the flight feathers on the wing are all the same color, and therefore the same age. An older bird would have a mix of old and new feathers.

Another similar way to age the bird was to put its wing under an ultraviolet light. The feathers all glowed pink. Older feathers do not have as much pink, and other birds do not have a uniform pink glow. Instead, it is only on some feathers, or, in very old birds, virtually nonexistent. Check out Trudy's website for photos that show this much better than I am describing it: http://www.battaly.com/banding/

After all the data was collected, everyone there got to hold the owl:

(Me and the Owl)

After the photo ops, we released the owl, and it flew off, almost ghostly, into the night.

It would seem like catching an owl on the first try would be a prequel to a great night of banding, but there were no birds for the next two hours, and we had to leave at 11, saying., "Well, we got one!" And that one made it all extremely worthwhile.

Fluffball

I found this Saw-whet Owl at in the Hunter Island pine Grove in Pelham Bay Park today. I am having good luck with owls lately!

Birding Stratford, Connecticut

A couple weekends ago I went on a Greenwich Audubon field trip to Stratford, Connecticut with Benjamin (Blog) and Ryan, lead by Brian O'Toole. Our first stop was the Great Meadows area of the Important Bird Area there.

We found a couple harriers, including a "gray ghost" male, and a buteo that we thought at first was a rough-legged hawk but turned out to be a wintering Red-shouldered Hawk. A little ways down the trail, we came across a large group of American Tree Sparrows, and I spotted a bald eagle flying over.

A shot of one of the harriers:

Of course its an eagle, can't you tell?:

We went out onto an overlook over the marsh to look for snowy owls, but all we found were black ducks.

Moving onward to Long Beach, we made a quick stop that netted a Gadwall but was otherwise unproductive. Benjamin was hoping for some Lapland Longspurs that had been reported. I was hoping for an Orange-crowned Warbler.

We scanned the sound for a little. A small group of Common Goldeneye were spotted, but that was it. My horned grebe curse continues. The wind picked up, and on a narrow strip of land with water on both sides, we were fairly exposed to it. Then we heard some call notes or something, and quickly spotted the Lapland Longspurs, 3 of them. An Ipswich (Savannah) Sparrow joined them. I had left my camera in the van, so no photos, but Benjamin got some: http://warblings.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/lapland.jpg

The orange-crowned warbler was not in its usual spot, and some people coming back told us it had been reported a ways out but they hadn't seen it. We figured that either it would take more time than we had to find it or it was dead, so that search was called off. On the way back to the car, I spotted a fly-by Killdeer.

The last stop in Stratford was a boat ramp where a Black-crowned Night-Heron had been seen. On the way there, we stopped at a pond where there were quite a few ducks, including Hooded Mergansers and Canvasback:

At the boat ramp, we first saw American Coots and Pied-billed Grebes, then walked over to the ditch where the night heron was sleeping. At least, we think it was sleeping. I never actually saw it move.

It just stayed in the same position for the whole time we were there. Still, I think it would have toppled over if it were dead.

We departed, but made a stop on the way back at Sherwood Island State Park to try to see a staked-out Saw-whet Owl. As soon as we entered the pine grove, a Great Horned Owl was on a branch right in front of us. It stared down for a second, then flew off. We searched unsuccessfully for the owl, but did see a couple Red-breasted Nuthatch.

Below: The tail-end of a Red-breasted Nuthatch.

Brian and Ryan went to check out a nearby pine grove, and they called us within 5 minutes- they had the bird. It happened to be in the exact same tree that Ryan had seen his life saw-whet a few years ago. It was a little hard to see, but we all ended up getting great views (And for me, some subpar photos).

See it?

Here's a very cropped photo:

It was a great trip, like any trip with an owl (let alone two) is. Also, given how early in the year it was, I saw 25 year birds. My year list is now up to 68.

Good Birding!