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