southern banders help band a couple of hawks

After the social we had the chance to take a couple of banders from the south out to see if we could catch a hawk. Recently the area seems to be hosting a number of roughlegged hawks and redtailed hawks. Catching hawks is very difficult and is often does not reward the effort it takes  but we had lots to catch up on so we headed out with high hopes and managed to catch a rough legged hawk and a young redtail.  The recent snow may ben the end of hawk season but we will soon be banding buntings. Hopefully we will have news about buntings soon. This photo is  of Theresa Mackenzie who made the trek up to take in the social and lucked out with a couple of hawks.

chris sukha returns in fine form to the marsh

Sometimes at the end of the banding season it takes a nudge to make a discovery. Chris Sukha returned to the marsh after being away banding in h B.C at Mackenzie bird observatory. So he made it back at the very end of owls and talked me into trying a few more nights. We managed to catch a boreal owls while he was out and an incredible 4 long eared owls. After  exchanging information and emails with other owl banders it turns out that we may be in area where we might actually be able to try for long eared owls by using a long eared call. one bander in northern Saskatchewan typically bands around 30 a season .  it is a pretty exciting prospect so we will give it a try. We ended up catching 7 for the season which is the best we have ever done our previous high was 5  long eared which we caught back in 2003 and we have caught a total of 24 over all of years. This year all of our long eared owls were caught while we were playing a boreal owl call.  Chris will be banding once again this spring at the marsh so hopefully if you have not met Chris yet you will this spring .  nice to have you back at the marsh Chris!!!

Rick ludkin a big hit at marsh social

I wanted to take a moment to thank Rick Ludkin and indeed all of the people who came out and joined us in a celebration of the marsh. Rick spoke to us about how the efforts of the banding station at kerns public fits into the Canadian Snow bunting network. I feel very privileged to have had rick come all the way from Ruthven Park where he bands. i also feel privileged to see so many friends come out to the marsh. Next year Maggie Macphearson has promised to come back and be our speaker as she will have finished her PhD and will have lots of news to pass along to us . Congratulations goes to Jacob Lachapelle our junior ebird winner and to Mike Werner who won the Sr. division. Well done!! Hope to see  many of the new faces we met at the marsh this winter . Thanks again to all who came and enjoyed the night and to all who had a hand in making the evening possible

marsh social November 7th join us

By bruce murphy

What I love about the marsh social is that is a chance to fill one room with people that love the marsh and want to learn more about it . For Joanne and I it is always a chance to be inspired and awed by the community of people who have come to love the marsh. The common thread to the gathering is that it gives us a chance to connect and to learn more about what people would like to see at the marsh. The other aspect of the marsh social is that we get a chance to catch up on the year we had at the marsh and let folks know how our banding projects are coming along. We have been fortunate to have some great speakers and this year we have Rick Ludkin as our guest speaker.

 Rick Ludkin is the coordinator of the Canadian Snow bunting network and he is going to talk about the marsh fits into the information that this network is learning. It will also be a chance to learn more about the great findings that the kerns public banding station has been accomplishing. Rick is a fantastic speaker and I am really looking forward to hearing what Rick has to say about the network and how our efforts are helping to piece together the mystery of the decline of the snow bunting population.

Rick started the Ruthven Park banding station and we have a special relationship with this station as we have helped train one of their banders Nancy Furber. 

Nancy journeyed here to learn how to band owls and hummingbirds. Nancy has helped us in many ways and Rick and Nancy continue to be an inspiration and valued colleagues in the banding fraternity. Joanne and I had a chance to visit their station and will no doubt be heading back to learn more.

Please join us November 7^th for a night of birds and community. If you need a ticket please get in touch. If you have never come to a marsh social I am sure you will enjoy it. Hope to see you there.

Owl banding season wrap up

By bruce murphy

Another owl banding season has pretty much come to a close and we were fortunate to get a glimpse into the lives of these mysterious owls. We managed to band 320 Northern sawwhet owls and 7 boreal owls and 2 long eared owls . Our last public night for owls was thanksgiving weekend and we had over 500 visitors over the length of the banding season come out to see the owls. Our research currently is how many boreals may be around this year.

 Boreal owls are usually caught in low numbers when it is not the peak of their migration which will happen next in 2016. The boreals peak every four years and in 2012 we banded 202 so you can imagine we look forward to this 4 ear event.

I wanted to take a moment and thank everyone who supported our research by buying a membership or making a donation during the banding. Your support makes a huge difference and allows us to carry on this important research as we are trying to learn more about these wonderful creatures of the night.  It was also great to meet so many new friends young and not so young. I also wanted to take a moment to thank every single adult you came with a youngling.

  Bringing young folks to the marsh is so huge in their development. Research on nature deficit disorder is compelling and kids need a chance to see and interact with the non- human world. Taking the time to bring kids to the marsh is huge and the look on kids’ faces when we take an owl out of a bag is not only priceless but reaffirms the need to foster this important link between kids and nature. I admire and thank you for taking the time to do this. Hopefully we will see you and your kids out at the marsh again. I know I have said this too many times, but thanks again it was a hoot!!!

Mrs P's grade 12 bio class comes to the marsh

Today I

had the chance to see future biologists at work and to have a chance to explain to a very attentive group about the science of  bird banding  and the potential for more projects at the marsh.

I think the marsh may have scored a bunch  of future volunteers as these students see the need to get their volunteer hours and to see the marsh as a way to gain some skills in bird identification to help them in their futures. Well perhaps this is all wishful thinking on my part. What i do know is that they were an amazing class and I am hoping to see them helping out at the marsh in the future. The wave of sparrows continues today we had way more recaptures of birds then banded birds. I was delighted when reed brought over an orange crowned warbler that we were able to catch at the feeder nets. As usual we only had the back net up for a very brief moment as it is so effective at catching songbirds.

Thanks for a great visit and hope to see you folks again soon


todays totals are as follows


white crowned sparrow 9
white throated sparrow 3
song sparrow  1
lincoln sparrow 1
junco  1
orange crowned warbler 1
retraps 35 plus white crowned
5 plus white throats
1 black capped chickadee

Mrs Macdonald the grade 8 teacher formerly known as miss sparrow brings her class to the marsh

white throated sparrow

It is great when someone with the name sparrow comes to the marsh especially when a wave of white crowned sparrows is still moving through the area.

Immature white crowned sparrow on left  adult white crowned on right

      Yesterday
I had the chance to enjoy a grade 8 class form Newliskeard public at the marsh and they indeed had a chance see us band 34 sparrows. We re-trapped over 50 so it was an amazing sparrow day at the marsh. We had one net we only opened for 5 minutes as it proves to be too successful at capturing birds . here is a picture of the net in question. it is rolled up here so it cannot capture birds. This pile of sticks is a structure i first saw used at tiny marsh. We throw mixed seed and cracked corn under the brush. the brush is supported by a simple frame to allow a frame of safety for the birds to feed protected from predators above. This structure allows us to bring in birds allowing us to get bands on a couple of hundred sparrows a year.
     Thanks to the kids for a great day. many student left with a promise to return and join the ranks of volunteers at the marsh. perhaps we have many future hall of fame extractors and maybe a few future marsh crew personnel to be hired by the marsh when they turn 17.

       The thrill of the day for the class was when NLPS student and marsh volunteer Cody Goddard located a blue jay in one of the nets. Well done Cody! It's nice when Cody can come to the marsh with his class as his classmates get to see his patiently acquired skills at the net and the marsh gains a volunteer that day.  If you are a parent of relative of a grade student that are thinking I know someone who would love to do that then we want to here from you!!!  Check out the contact button on the website to get us volunteer information.

Today's totals

26 white crowned sparrows
8 white throated sparrows
2 blue jays
2 ruby crowned kinglet
1 slate colured junco

please note that you will not find a photo of a student holding a ruby crowned certain species we do not allow inexperienced handlers to hold  and ruby crowns with their tiny legs top that list.

Bird is the word! Murph

Owls in the marsh family...last weekend for public owl banding

This  owl season has been an interesting one and while we are closing in on 200 birds banded it has not been a typical season for us  and it all has to do with the weather. In the back of my mind with climate change looming this may become the new normal. First of all sawwhets migrate! While some of them linger through the winter catching mice( how I do not know) and perhaps a few birds . The majority of them migrate as far south as Alabama but the state only catches a few birds each banding season I believe hy have a high of 14 birds in a banding season. Before bob Sargeant starting trying they did not even know they had them that far south. The bulk of “our “birds that we band end up in Pennsylvania and west Virginia .

            The gas for the migration is a cold front. Cool nights make the little owls get going.^rd just the other night.

The only issue this year is that most days and nights for that matter we have been experiencing strong winds out of the south. The winds were blowing so strong on Saturday night that we were only able to catch one owl and Friday night was lost to rain. Weather conditions have certainly had an impact on the migration which is a shame because when we get good conditions we are catching a good number of owls and most of the owls that we are catching are birds that hatched this spring. Usually when there is a good hatch our numbers are very strong. Banders in the south have been paying attention to our numbers to see when it is worthwhile ot get their nets up. The migration seems to be possibly as late as three weeks. The other sign that the migration has stalled is that we are catching a large number of birds that we have banded this year a second time. We even caught a bird that we originally banded on September 23

            On a positive note we have been having record numbers of people coming out to see the owls that are proving so hard to catch. This weekend we can anticipate a packed “birdhouse” as families want to bring relatives out to see owls. The other factor that influences catching success is the moon phase. We always do best when there is no moon. The full moon seems to stop the owls moving and there is a lot of debate around this topic which I will save for another time. This weekend is the full moon so I am hoping for lots of cloud cover.  This weekend is also our last public owl banding nights.

The gate opens at 8:30 and our first net check is close to 9 30 so if you are hoping to see an owl Saturday night is your last chance. The other thing if you want to see an owl perhaps get your kids to do an owl dance before they come out to help us catch one  especially if it is a cloudless windy warm night.  Please don’t be upset with me but I am hoping for a cloudy chilly night you will to if you give a hoot!!

Here are our numbers and dates for the year

September 15                  1

18     2

21     2

22     0

23     28 plus 1 foreign retrap

24     17 plus 1 foreign retrap

25     30

26     26 plus 1 foreign retrap

27     18 plus  1 foreign retrap

30     36

October

1         13 plus 1 foreign retrap

2         5

4             4      3

5          5     7     

7             7       1     long eared owl

**** note a foreign retrap really means  the capture of a bird banded  at another location and not by us . This is the essence of what banding is all about and is super exciting to catch a bird  from another location. We know the bird caught on the night of September 23^rd was originally

banded in the spring of 2011 in northern Michigan. Saty tuned for more news about the other owls as I get the information.

Bird is the word! murph

rain out and a sparrow update

So while we were rained out today I had the chance to go hunting for a new site to band boreal owls  and I had the chance to look at our sparrow numbers once again. In an earlier blog I was surprised to see that white throat numbers were leading  white crowns on Friday we banded  25 more white crowns  which has left us  with 135 white crowns and 110 white throated sparrows as well I did not get a chance to provide a species list for the class from Englehart that visited  so here are our numbers

White crowned sparrows 25
dark eyed junco 10
american goldfinch 2
black capped chickadee 1
white throated sparrow 1
downy woodpecker 1
blue jay 1
yellow rump 1
purple finch 1



44 birds  9 species

Not bad for just 4 nets and we had to roll them after the firs net check as we only catch as many birds as we can safely handle. After the birds we had were banded we put the nets up again to catch more birds. The upshot of this is that when we run the feeder nets we only get a snap shot of the birds we have in the are in the fall. if we had more than 1 bander and more folks who can extract birds then our numbers would be more representative of what are coming to the feeders. The safety of the birds always comes first. It is interesting to see that southern banding stations are just starting to catch white crowned sparrows so it is just a matter of time before the white crowns move on to be replaced  flocks of tree sparrows which always is a harbinger of cooler temperatures to come so be on the look out and I will keep you posted on what we see at the marsh.-  MURPH

A week of sparrows and school groups and a plea for help at the marsh

Had another great week of visiting classes . Visiting classes from New Likseard, Elk lake, and Englehart had a chance to see the banding of sparrows up close  and we managed to catch a few  blue jays and the occasional warbler as well stragglers in the great spectacle that is the fall migration. 

School groups also had the chance to look for aquatic creatures and frogs  which have all but disappeared burrowing into the mud to prepare for the ice and frigid temperatures that are fast approaching

One of the exciting  things about being a bander is that there is always another migration to look forward to. As soon as we say goodbye to the white throated and white crowned sparrows the american tree sparrows will be arriving .  After the tree sparrows move on  snow buntings and the winter finches will be keeping us busy. One aspect of the fall migration that creates pangs of regret for me is that we do not have enough volunteers to run our station at full capacity and for those who know our banding operation we can only operate our 4 feeder nets  as we cannot handle the amount of birds at the feeders and run all of our other nets. The other nets often do not produce enough birds to occupy school groups  but we are giving up the chance to catch kinglet and warblers. The answer tour dilemma is to attract more volunteers who would like to become competent at extracting birds and allow us to monitor the fall migration the way we can in the spring. If you are sitting on the fence about becoming involved at the marsh please stay posted for chances this late fall and winter for training days at the marsh.  in recent days there have been a number of studies and reports outlining the present and future threats to birds. This negative news emphasizes the need to carry on our research at the marsh so please get involved and help us with our research at the marsh. We have a migrating species waiting for you.

Bird is the word! murph

A day and a night in the life of a bander

Sometimes I think it its important to paint a picture for the reader because I live a very blessed life.  I am writing this blog at the marsh I just hustled  my fanny to get  up the owls nets and I have half an hour in the “birdhouse” to write up a blog about today's banding results before 55 students arrive from northern college to come and see how we band northern saw whet owls. Then after a night of owl banding I will be visited by most of elk lake public school for a morning of songbird banding…..live is sweet!!

         Today I had 24 grade 4 students form Newliskeard public school and we had an interesting morning of banding indeed. I was fortunate to have the help of volunteers. Grade 8 student and bander in training Cody Goddard from NLPS and we also had a volunteer from Presquile  Provincial park Kristen well I can’t remember her last name . … fast forward to 1:20 A.M.

           Well back to the picture painting. It is now 1:20 am and the group form Northern college arrived half an hour early so I could not finish my blog so  we have had an amazing night of owls with an amazing group of dedicated young folk committed to helping animals. I feel inspired to have a spent an evening with them.

 Rather then get some shut eye I am going to finish this blog and I have to check the nets in half an hour. I have been alone since dalas forget left me at site b and mark Milton left after we checked the shed nets and banded the owls we caught there at midnight. I know this is a bit rambly but it is late and it is a banding blog and I am a bit tired so we will get back to our visit from NLPS.

     Had a great group of energetic grade 4’s who all seemed to love nature and wanted to connect to birds and wildlife in general. Grade  4’s are the perfect age for a trip to the marsh. We managed to band 34 birds but we probably le go at least 30 re-trapped sparrows.  We did have a few surprises we banded two late warblers a common yellow throat and a Nashville and both caught at the feeder nets. We also caught a bunch of kinglets and a brown creeper in the back corner, which always seem to happen in the fall and someday someone will explain what is going on.  It would seem that we almost always only catch golden crowned kinglets in the fall and always in the back corner. We almost always catch brown creepers when we are catching both species of kinglets and today was no exception.

`       Past Terra student Maggie Macphearson was telling me that there is some evidence to suggest that birds choose their migration partners based on a role they might be able to fill. When we record what birds we band we seldom record what birds we band together so most evidence is purely anecdotal but perhaps more work will be done  and what birds are caught together in the same net at the same time.  I do know that in the fall the back corner nets are super inconsistent and every now and then they yield creepers and kinglets of both species. Our final count of  the today is as follows.

Brown creeper 1

Ruby crowned kinglet 4

Golden crowned kinglet 4

American goldfinch 8

Nashville warbler 1

Common yellow throat 1

Black capped chickadee 1

White throated sparrow 4

White crowned sparrow 17

Slate coloured junco 1

42 birds  10 species

bird is the word! Murph

Canada Culture Days events at the marsh

Months ago we received an email from Pam Mackenzie asking if we would like to be part of  Canada culture days  and after getting approval form the HMREC board of directors we were happy to agree . This past weekend was Canada culture days and we had the chance to host 2 owl banding events and a  a song bird banding event. We had about 100 people join us for all of the banding and we were successful in banding a bunch of owls and managed to band about 30 songbirds  the majority being sparrows and we wowed the crowd with a beautiful blue jay.  I think the important reason that the marsh is involved in culture days is that conservation and taking care of nature is a huge part of being  Canadian and should be  highlighted and honoured during culture day.   Pam was very excited about the marsh being a part of the celebration and has already asked us to be a part of next years  event. We are so in !!!!! thanks Pam and to everyone who joined in the fun. Murph

dsb1 students enjoy the marsh

Every spring and fall dsb1 students migrate to the marsh to have a chance to see how we do research and to see the true marvel of the  migration. This autumn the Canada goose and sandhill migration has been a spectacle to the delights of grade four and seven  and various high school classes. Students have been helping out with our bird banding efforts by transporting birds from the nets to the banding lab to have their specific numbered band put on their leg giving us a chance to monitor the migration. We are very fortunate to have the support of DSB1 director Linda Knight who has been a champion of getting students out to the marsh over the years.

     One of the things I love about banding with the kids in the fall is that they love the chance to band blue jays. We could have one of the rarest warblers or a seldom seen boreal chickadee but a blue jay wins the day in the hearts and minds of the students.  We have been having dsb1 students come to the marsh to band birds since 1996 next year we will be celebrating our 20th year of banding at the marsh and we hope to perhaps band our 60,000 bird. Celebrate is a good word for it, and the purpose of this blog is to draw attention to a partnership worth celebrating. The ultimate winners are the kids that get to enjoy a day at the marsh, one can never fully comprehend the impact that a bird in the hand can have. In the words of Rachel Carson famous  conservationist "If a child is to keep ones inborn sense of wonder, they need the companionship of at least one adult  who can share it. Rediscovering with them the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in." Bird is the word! murph

owl banding update 126 0wls and counting

Greetings friends of the night or perhaps friends of  the little owl know as the northern saw whet owl. This year's banding season has been interesting, perplexing, a little frustrating, and full of questions  about the movements of these little owls. It has also been a season of tweaking the process of having visitors to the marsh in an attempt at making the visit as fun for everyone as possible. I hope to get to all of these ideas in this blog so here goes.

With the substantial cold front that moved through at the beginning of September I was certain that we were going to have a quick and awesome start to the banding season. The cold front was soon replaced with warm night time temperatures and the migration seemed to stall . We caught our first owl on September  15th at 11:50 and after a week of banding had only captured  5 owls . I was shocked especially after hearing reports of over 100 owls being banded at Rocky Point Bird Observatory  in Victoria British  Columbia and knowing we had visitors soon to be visiting the marsh I was concerned about the status of owl banding this year at the marsh. The second week of banding was much better and we had some nights of 30  and 28 owls being banded which brings us to our current total of 126 owls being banded. Just to compare British Columbia banders are now at 326 for the season.

      Our success last week went in the face of what we usually experience with warm temperatures. Usually when we have warm temperatures we hardly catch any owls. They move on cold fronts and when I told a group of 50 owlers last Friday who were very hot in the "birdhouse" that we always do well when we have to put the wood stove on, someone responded "then put some wood in the stove!"  With the warmer temperatures we managed to catch enough owls to delight ort visitors but our best net check time has been the 4:00 am check.  I am really looking forward to some cold windless nights to see how many owls we can catch this week.

        The other thing we have been attempting to do is to get people to come out closer to the the 9:30 net check.  We have discovered that in order to run the research effectively  banders need some time to get organized and to carry out some of the routine items that need to be recorded or maintained or sometimes I just need sleep. So to this end we are starting to keep the gate shut at the entrance. We will open the gate between 8 30 and 9 when we are ready for visitors. We think this will help streamline the night and make the visit more enjoyable. One thing that it will do is help folks to make the night more efficient  we have had some nights when people show up for more than 2 hours before we start catching owls and some folks with little ones who had to leave just prior to a net check as the little ones were just played out. While I am excited that people are keen to see owls we need to help people know when to come closer to owl time  and everyone can enjoy the night much more . We are always looking forward to feedback on this  and everything we do at the marsh. I was checking out a website of an owl banding site in Wisconsin today and they limit the number of visitors to 38 and folks have to pay 15 bucks for a chance to come out. While that certainly helps the organization financially and limits the number of folks coming out I think we will keep with this system for the time being. Having visitors on Wednesday Friday and Saturday is providing us with nights to train volunteers on the off nights which is working out nicely. To find out more about volunteering check out the website.If you would like more information about our owl banding research please let us know . More news on owls to come. Murph

white crowns and white throats as epic as the leafs vs the canadiens

This fall we have been having a wonderful time banding  sparrows  specifically we have been banding a great deal of white crowned and white throated sparrows  and while banding is never a competition  it is always interesting to see how the  numbers play out. This particular fall we have been catching a great deal of white throated sparrows I would say more than we normally catch and we usually catch a lot of of white crowned sparrows. I had the feeling that it was worth checking the numbers to see what we had caught more of.  And just like some birders will  tend to identify with one species more than the other  it seems a natural inclination to bring up old rivalries like the leafs and the candiens.  So for a moment before  glimpsing to the bottom to see the final numbers for this years  sparrow  debate I was interested to look up the  record of the leafs vs the candiens .  In  742 regular season games  montreal  leads the leafs with 342 wins to  286 for the leafs. They also have the edge in playoff match ups  with 42 to 29.  I am not making a good case for the leafs or the white throats as  over the years

we have caught  2880 white crowns  and only 1817 white throats.

This  year however  the numbers are super close  we have banded 81  white throats  to date and 75 white crowns. Why am I cheering for the white throats ? Is it because they are the" under-birds?"  Is it because they breed in our area and we hear their song all May and June  and  the white crowns only stop here to feed as they prepare for the next stage of their journey. Or is it because the white throat call was one of  the first birds  beside a loon I ever learned  by ear? Who knows, such musings have to be endured by the reader as I have been doing this long enough to see patterns emerging at the marsh and want to pass them along. Clearly I look forward to each species each spring and fall. After a long winter  I look forward to hearing  the song of a white throat as much as   a victory of the leafs over the Canadiens.  Hopefully I will never have to wait as long as leaf fans have for a Stanley Cup. That would be a cruel thing to do to someone who loves sparrows. Go leafs go! Murph

Catching up

Well here we are, the idea behind the blog was to keep people posted  about how we have been doing at the marsh and I think I am suffering from the notion that everything i write has to be wise and inspirational. I can hear the laughter so lets get to what a banders blog is supposed to be about birds and what we have banded at the marsh this fall. So without any more drama  lets get to the birds. So far this late summer and early Autumn we have banded  about 400 birds representing  38 species . While the following list is not complete here are some of the highlights of the season


warblers in no taxonomic order this  is the order I copied them off the banding sheets

American redstart
yellow- rumped warbler
palm warbler

cape may warbler
bay breasted warbler
magnolia warbler
Nashville warbler
Canada warbler

chestnut sided warbler
Tennessee warbler
orange crowned warbler
mourning warbler
common yellow throat
black and white warbler

sparrows
chipping
song
swamp
white throat
white crowned

other birds

alder flycatcher
least flycatcher
olive sided flycatcher ***** The second we have ever banded
purple finch
ruby crowned kinglet
brown creeper
red breasted nuthatch
rose breasted grosbeak
swainsons thrush
veery
hairy woodpecker
 blue jay
red winged blackbird
red eyed vireo
Philadelphia vireo
american gold finch
black capped chickadee
northern saw whet owl

Try saying all of those birds in one breath!!! So that is what we have been up to please keep checking the blog for more highlights as I will try and both figure out to make posts and do them in a timely fashion.. Please stay in touch if you would like to become involved or if you have any questions or suggestions for us at the Hilliardton marsh.   Murph