09-24-18 Fall Migration Songbird Banding

09-24-18 Fall Migration Songbird Banding

September 24, 2018

The University of Montana Bird Ecology Lab shares songbird captures from August 9th to September 9th. This note also details UMBEL's help with the nocturnal flight call recording project.

092218_Umbel-migration-1.jpg

We began monitoring the fall migration of songbirds on August 9th at two locations on MPG Ranch. The first location is our long-term monitoring site on the northern Floodplain, and the second is a new site at Miller Creek Meadow.

092218_Umbel-migration-2.jpg

Table 1. Total captures by species from 9 Aug – 7 Sept.

092218_Umbel-migration-3.jpg

With help from the MPG Field Crew, we set up a new banding site at Miller Creek Meadow.

092218_Umbel-migration-4.jpg

On the first day at our new Miller Creek site, we captured this previously banded Song Sparrow

092218_Umbel-migration-5.jpg

The Miller Creek Meadow site has yielded other exciting captures, including two Varied Thrushes

092218_Umbel-migration-6.jpg

Since 2011, we have observed relatively high capture rates and diversity each fall at the northern Floodplain site.

092218_Umbel-migration-7.jpg

While an uncommon bird can generate excitement, we also find a great deal of beauty in more common captures.

092218_Umbel-migration-8.jpg

In addition to the two migration monitoring sites, this year we are assisting the MPG Ranch, Project Night Flight, and Intermountain Bird Observatory in a collaborative effort to gather more nocturnal flight calls from western birds

092218_Umbel-migration-9.jpg

In a third effort to assist in recording nocturnal flight calls, we opened nets at the northern Floodplain site just before sunset hoping to capture songbirds as they took off for their evening migratory flights.

Previous Field Note

Tree Swallow Breeding Season: Observations from the Field

Next Field Note

06-07-19 Bird Field Note

What would you like to learn about?

09-24-18 Fall Migration Songbird Banding

Block title

09-24-18 Fall Migration Songbird Banding

Previous Field Note

Next Field Note

Related Field Notes

Related Research

Related Photo Galleries