Honing Banding Skills

My project is officially in the "data processing" and not the "data collecting" phase. I'm reading a lot of primary literature, analyzing recorded songs, and preparing my thesis for defense. These are all extremely important aspects of a scientific project but I have to admit, they're not as enjoyable as being out in the field collecting the data and working with the birds first-hand.

Luckily I still have the opportunity to get outside banding birds as a volunteer with the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory. Since beginning as a "Predator Patroller" (keeping an eye out for foxes, feral cats, etc.) there nearly two years ago now I've gained skills first as an "Extractor" (able to get birds out of nets) and finally as a full fledged bander (code name E7!) 

Fall migration is in full swing and we've been busy the past few weeks.This past Sunday we had so many birds come in I didn't leave the banding table once! It was a great day to practice my skills identifying, quantifying fat, determining degrees of skull ossification, and aging different species of birds. 

Here's just a small subset of the birds that came through. 

A really tough Townsend's warbler.

Fox sparrow. I am quite partial to these birds - These were some of the first birds I learned how to handle. They also kick up leaves like crazy while forraging. Reminds me of how a dog kicks up grass with its back legs after it poops.

Lincoln sparrow - These have just a smooth clean look about them. They're a treat to see up close.

Black phoebe. These birds are not caught too often - they're extremely agile flyers and usually dodge the nets. 

Bushtit. These birds can be sexed by eye color! A light eye, like this lady here, indicates she's a female. Bushtits are some of the tiniest birds we catch but also the spunkiest. They travel in flocks, constantly twittering back and forth to each other. 

Ok I'm not going to label this one. I would hope you could recognize it by now ;)