2020 ended up being an odd year to start COS’s first ever bird banding station at Big Marsh! First, our banding team was not even sure we would be able to get the banding station up and running this year, especially with stay-at-home orders in place at the beginning of the season. Then, there was the matter of banding station set-up – pounding four feet of rebar into oily slag is no joke! Normally, we would operate our nets with a central banding station, but due to Covid-19 our three researchers had to operate three separate “mini stations” to maintain social distancing.

**Socially-distant banding station. Photo: Anastasia Rahlin**

It got a little lonely out in the field, but we kept in touch in real time over text, posting photos of birds or sharing molt ageing tips. The real bird nerds know there ain’t no party like a bird molt texting party!

After 5 successful dates in the field between June and August, our first banding season wrapped up for the summer. We captured 202 birds and had 13 recaptures (birds that we already banded and caught again another time). In total, we banded 21 species. If you walk by a marsh and hear “Sweet, sweet, I’m so sweet”, “Fitz-bew!” or “Mewww” you just might spot some of the most common species we captured: Yellow Warblers, Willow Flycatchers, and Gray Catbirds.

Some other common interlopers caught in the net were the aptly-named Common Yellowthroats, some of whom were just beginning to grow in their masks.

Our most unique birds (species we only caught 1 of during the whole season) were Baltimore Oriole, American Redstart, Eastern Kingbird and a single Mourning Dove (which had to go unbanded since we didn’t have a large enough band!)

Please see this previous blog post for more information on our banding efforts and how this station got started. We’ll be back in the spring for more updates!

**The masked banding team (left to right): Anastasia Rahlin, Stephanie Beilke, Libby Keyes.**

Species Totals for 2020:

American Goldfinch: 9
American Redstart: 1
American Robin: 25
Baltimore Oriole: 1
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher: 3
Common Yellowthroat: 10
Downy Woodpecker: 4
Eastern Kingbird: 1
European Starling: 1
Field Sparrow: 2
Gray Catbird: 44
House Wren: 19
Indigo Bunting: 4
Northern Cardinal: 5
Northern Flicker (Yellow-shafted): 3
Red-winged Blackbird: 2
Song Sparrow: 18
Swamp Sparrow: 2
Willow Flycatcher: 12
Yellow Warbler: 34

TOTAL: 202

Bird Banding End of 2020 Season Summary