09/05/2021
The change of season was so evident today out at our banding station at the Morse Preserve.
We finished our US Geological Survey study of avian productivity and survivorship (MAPS) three weeks ago. Then I co-taught the PSBO banding course with my good friend and PSBO President Chris Southwick. Then, I get the team back together for the autumn sessions. This is how I've rounded out the last three summers.
These sessions are the most exciting banding days of the year, because the potential for catching strange and unusual stuff goes through the roof! Birds are on the move, and as birders you're likely aware of the late migration oddities.
Today, we caught a bird we almost never catch at our station. It's not a rare bird, or at all unusual in our location, but we rarely catch them. In the three years of my study, we've only caught two.
Today, though, we caught two more Lincoln's Sparrows, looking glorious in the morning sun. Being in the genus Melospiza, it's not surprising that they look very similar to one of the birds in our study, the illustrious and ever present Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia. But this species is much smaller, has less gray in the plumage, and is very much it's own unique thing.
Love you, Lincoln's Sparrows.
