Arrival and first day of banding at Powdermill!

Hi there!

Yesterday I had a long long travelling day. My flight at Schiphol departured at 10.50 and 8 hours later, 13.00 local time I arrived at Philadelphia Airport. At Philadelphia I had to check in my luggage again for my connecting flight to Pittsburgh. In the airplane to Philly the stewardesses cleary said to me that I had to pick up my luggage from the caroussel and re check it in. When I got off from the plane I had to go to the passport control. Apparently the guy from customs didn´t fully trust me because I had to go to a seperate room for second inspection! After 15 min or so I could go and then I found out that my luggage wasn´t on the caroussel. So I thought I´d lost it... Nevertheless I had to grab my flight to Pittsburgh, which I did. At the x ray and luggage check I got picked out again, this time the customs checked me ´randomly´ for drug samples on my hands, good! After they had checked me thoroughly I could proceed to my gate and without any problems I arrived in Pittsburgh, 38 minutes later. At the caroussel in Pittsburgh I was happy to find my suitcase, yay! Some time later Andrew, the banding coordinator of Powdermill, picked me up. He was unlucky, because on his way to the airport he got a flat tire, so he came a little later. From the airport it was still a 1,5/2 hour drive to Powdermill. Around 9 I arrived at my cabin, which is situated beautifully in the woods!

So this morning I got up at 6.00 and went to the banding station. At the banding station I met with Andrew, Mary, Heather, Amy and Lauren: some of the crew from the banding station. It was a beautiful but cold morning.

The area.

We had a good morning with over a 100 birds. 75 new ones and about 30 recaptures. Below you can see the numbers plus the species (only containing the new ones):

Ruby-throated Hummingbird 18 -
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 3 -
Acadian Flycatcher 1 -
Alder Flycatcher 1 -
Least Flycatcher 1 -
Red-eyed Vireo 6 -
Black-capped Chickadee 2 -
Veery 1 -
Swainson´s Thrush 2 -
Wood Thrush 1 -
Gray Catbird 2 - (and about 10 recaps orso!!)
Chestnut-sided Warbler 2 -
Magnolia Warbler 1 -
Black-throated Blue Warbler 2 -
Black-throated Green Warbler 2 -
American Redstart 1 -
Ovenbird 2 -
Northern Waterthrush 1 -
Connecticut Warbler 1 - First of the year!
Common Yellowthroat 3 -
Hooded Warbler 14 -
Scarlet Tanager 1 -
Eastern Towhee 1 -
Rose-breasted Grosbeak 3 -
Indigo Bunting 1 -
Total 75, 25 species (excluding recaps)

Some pics of the American birds! :

Ruby-throated Hummingbird

Red-eyed Vireo, hatched year

Red-eyed Vireo, adult

Veery

Black-throated Green Warbler, hatched year male

Connecticut Warbler, adulte male; day´s highlight!

Northern Waterthrush

Rose-breasted Grosbeak, hatched year male; awesome birds! They seem to love your fingers ;)

This afternoon I went to do some groceries shoppings in Ligonier, a town closeby, together with Andrew. On our way passed the Powdermill visitors centre where I met some nice people. On our way back we saw 6 Eastern Bluebirds which was nice. While I´m typing this blog post I see a beautiful Pileated Woodpecker foraging on a tree just outside my house! 

So this was it for today, many more pics from the nice crew & banding station will follow in later blog posts!