I should've had my net open

I was looking out of the window this morning and was surprised when I saw this first year female Sparrowhawk sitting in our apple tree!

Searching the area for some tasty garden birds!

Last winter I had a Sparrowhawk sitting in our apple tree as well. They're so awesome! Then, as it was looking around it took off, right through my closed net.... Ohhhhhhhh, I hate it when birds fly through closed nets (11 Solitary Sandpipers, 1 Spotted Sandpiper and now this Sparrowhawk, haha!).

Taking off.

Afterwards I went to my own ringing site. I hadn't been there for a while. While checking out the netlanes I flushed a Woodock. I could see it very well as it was flying past me. They sure look bigger than the American Woodcock, they probably are. It's getting time that I will catch one! At the ringing site I had some gold/firecrests, most species of tits and some fly-overs of Crossbills and Siskins.

Ringing in the garden: that's been a while ago!

It was time for some garden ringing again. I put my 6 m up this morning and had it open from 7.30 till 14.00. There was a strong NE wind blowing which wasn't really helpful for netting. Nevertheless I caught quite a few birds. I managed to ring 5 House Sparrows. I colourringed 4 of them. I didn't colourring the 5th because it had a bump on its right leg what looked like to be an old break, but it was totally healed again. A Collared Dove was hanging in the net for a while, it looked like it would stay in the net pocket, but I was just busy colourringing a House Sparrow so once I ran out the door for the dove it escaped from the net.. too bad, but I'll get them!

Totals:

Robin 1 -
Dunnock 1 - 2
Blue Tit 1 -
Great Tit 3 - 1
House Sparrow 5 -
Chaffinch 1 -

15 birds, 6 species

 Chaffinch, adult male

 colourringed House Sparrow, male

On one of the male House Sparrow I noticed this weird primary covert:

A long primary covert.. I've never seen this with any birds before?

an adult Blue Tit

Back home!!

After staying three days longer at Powdermill, Thursday was my second (and final) try to get to Holland! I banded a couple of hours in the morning before I took off with Brandon, who took me to the airport. 

My final morning we banded the following birds (birds after I left included):

Black-capped Chickadee 1 -

Golden-crowned Kinglet 3 -

Ruby-crowned Kinglet 5 -

Cedar Waxwing 10 -

Yellow-rumped Warbler 1 -

Song Sparrow 2 -

White-throated Sparrow 2 -

Dark-eyed Junco 5 -

Northern Cardinal 1 -

House Finch 3 -

American Goldfinch 44 -

Total 78, 12 species

We left Powdermill at 10.20 and arrived around 11.50. I said goodbye to Brandon. I had a really good time living together with Brandon the past two months. We had a lot of fun together!

Everything went smooth this time: the drive, the check-in, the security etc. Already after 20 min I could sit and wait at the gate, for the departuring flight at 3.05 pm. The flight from Pittsburgh to Philly was good, I was seated just behind the business class so I had a lot of space. I arrived in Philly around 4.30 pm. Here I had to wait about 3,5/4 hours for my flight to Amsterdam. In the mean time, I ate a slice of pizza, had a Dunkin Donut and drank a delicious strawberry smoothie. Then, at 8.50 pm, I flew home, to Amsterdam! This flight was less pleasant, as I was seated next to the lavatory, which was used frequently.. so you can imagine what that is like... Luckily for me, I slept most of the time and the time flew by so I was glad when I arrived at Schiphol at 9.30 in the morning! At Schiphol everything went fast, faster than usual! As I got out of the plane, I went through the passport check, arrived at the bagage claim where I could immediately grab my suitcase and left for the train to go to Apeldoorn. I arrived at 9.40 at the train platform where I had the train from 9.50 to Apeldoorn. Once I got home I had a shower and a two hour nap. I'm glad that my trip back has been so smooth!!

 

I was happy to see my family again (they were happy too ofcourse). I slept good last night (didn't wake up a single time!!). This morning I woke up at 7.30, to do some ringing (As if I hadn't done enough the last couple of months haha). I am now switching over again to the European terminology! So from now on you'll see me writing ringing instead of banding, first calenderyear instead of hatching year etc. hahah! I have difficulties with it already.  

It was nice to see Hans, Henri and Dirk again. It's been a good fall for the Meintjes with a lot of tits being caught! Last week, Hans caught more than 70 Blue Tits on three occasions. Hans told me that this year we've had more than 2000 new birds already in the Meintjes, which is really good.

Today was a decent morning too. When Tammo and I left around 13.30 the counter stood on 25 Blue Tits and 13 Great Tits, but Hans stayed a bit longer so he might have had some more. With our clap net we caught a Meadow Pipit, which was cool. 

Now some European bird species again!!!

Great Tit, 1cy

 Robin, 1cy

Meadow Pipit, 1cy

When I got home I saw that I had gotten my Nyjer feeder! So this afternoon I put it up in our backyard. I used a nice mistnet pole to attach the feeder on. With a bit of creativity it fit on, and this is the result:

Now let's hope that the birds like it too!

A recapture Saw-whet last night!

With last nights banding with caught 3 Saw-whet Owls. 2 of them were new and 1 of them was a recapture!! The recapture rates on these owls are high because a lot of people band them in fall in the nortern states of the U.S and in Canada. It was pretty cool that we already had a Saw-whet recapture this fast, as we have only banded 6 Saw-whets so far! The three birds were a hatching-year, a second-year and an after-second-year.

Saw-whet Owl, hatching year; no moult pattern present

Saw-Whet Owl, second year; the typical moult pattern of a SY. The outer primaries and inner secondaries are new.

The recaptured bird. Eventhough it is really subtle it seems that you can distinguish three generations of feathers which makes this a ASY. The colours red and blue show the new feathers (generations).

Two Saw-whets posing next to eachother/

The weird looking ear of an owl!

The banding today was pretty slow, with 78 birds being caught. The internet was out this afternoon at the banding lab so I don't have the numbers yet. We didn't capture anything exciting although this orange-crowned Ruby-crowned Kinglet was interesting:

Totals:

Winter Wren 1 -

White-breasted Nuthatch 1 -

Gray Catbird 1 -

Cedar Waxwing 8 -

Chipping Sparrow 1 -

Fox Sparrow 1 -

Song Sparrow 1 -

White-throated Sparrow 5 -

Dark-eyed Junco 12 -

Northern Cardinal 1 -

American Goldfinch 23 -

Total 55, 11 species

Tomorrow I'll be banding for a few hours in the morning before I take off to the airport, for a second try! I have now booked one flight earlier to Philadelhpia to make sure I won't miss my connection in Philly. So tomorrow will be my last day for real!!

I guess I'm not back yet

I thought that yesterday would be my last day here in the US. But I was proved wrong! Yesterday, me, Brandon, Mary, Amy and Heather went to Pittsburgh, to the Science Center, one of the four Carnegie Museums/ After our visit here we would eat at Chipotle and then they would drop me off at the airport.

The A-team van of Mary. Now listen to this: The A-team theme song!

The Science Center was good fun. We explored some cool stuff and went in a Submarine for example! After that we ate at Chipotle and then went to the airport.

YumYum at Chipotle!

I was already checked-in online and only had to check-in my suitcase. I said everybody goodbye and went through security. Then, later, as I was waiting to board Flight 1893 to Philadelphia of 5.45 pm. me, and all the other passengers suddenly heard around 5.30 that the flight had been delayed. And then, a few minutes later we heard it was canceled!! Whaaaaat???????? The agents of US Airways said that the airplane had 'mechanical problems' and was not able to fly Philadelphia. Well, thanks US Airways, this will be the last time I'll fly with you! I had to call someone from US Airways to see when my next flight back would go. I rescheduled my flight for coming Thursday, at 3.05 pm. On the one hand I was a bit mad because I was convinced that I would be home today. On the other hand I didn't really mind as I had a couple of extra days here! I called Mary and told her the bad news. Mary etc. were still stuck in traffic so they could come and pick me up again. So there I was, back at Powdermill. We didn't tell Drew yet yesterday, you should've seen the look on his face this morning when I reappeared!

Anyway, I still would like to share some pics from Owl banding Sunday night. Next to a young bird, we also caught an adult (a second-year).

Northern Saw-Whet Owl, second-year. On the wing you can see two generations of feathers, making this bird a second year. The bird showed an odd moult pattern however, normally the most outer primaries and inner secondaries are replaced, instead of what you see on the above photo.

Note the hind of yellow on the old primaries/secondaries and the hint of pink on the new primaries/secondaries. Pretty weird!

 Posing in my hand

Posing on my head!

Posing after release

So today we were banding again. It was a sunny morning with a bit of frost on the nets in the morning. The nets were visible so the numbers dropped after the sun came through.

Northern Flicker 1 -

White-breasteds Nuthatch 1 -

Winter Wren 3 -

Golden-crowned Kinglet 2 -

Ruby-crowned Kinglet 2 -

Hermit Thrush 2 -

Cedar Waxwing 12 -

Yellow-rumped Warbler 4 -

Song Sparrow 6 -

Swamp Sparrow 5 -

White-throated Sparrow 10 -

Dark-eyed Junco 5 -

Northern Cardinal 1 -

Purple Finch 2 -

American Goldfinch 19 -

House Sparrow 1 -

Totals 76, 16 species

There were a lot of Waxwings around. They weren't shy as you can see above. This one dropped his berry, which was actually too big for him!

Purple Finch, after-hatching year male

Hatching-year Titmouse on the left. After hatching-year Titmouse on the right. Note the difference in primary coverts (just as with our Blue/Great Tits.

Ahwww, this Ruby-crowned Kinglet just got weighed in the cone!

Powdermill, I'm going to miss you!

And there it was already.. my last day at Powdermill! These two months went by so fast, too fast..! I've enjoyed being here so much with all the kind people around me, but of course also all the wonderful North-American birds. I'm going to miss all of the Powdermill banding crew!

So today was my last banding day. Despite the frozen nets (again) we caught a lot of birds, about 165, of which 124 were new, spread over 17 species. I didn't get any new ones for me in the hand anymore, although we almost caught a group of 10 Bluebirds. But no, these birds were too smart for us and sat on the netpoles and lines! It was a goldfinch day with 66 Goldfinches banded.

Tufted Titmouse 1 -
Golden-crowned Kinglet 1 -
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 4 -
Yellow-rumped Warbler 7 -
Eastern Towhee 1 -
Chipping Sparrow 1 -
Field Sparrow 4 -
Fox Sparrow 1 -
Song Sparrow 5 -
Lincoln's Sparrow 1 -
Swamp Sparrow 2 -
White-throated Sparrow 8 -
Dark-eyed Junco 19 -
Northern Cardinal 1 -
House Finch 1 -
American Goldfinch 66 -
House Sparrow 1 -

Total 124 (165 incl recaps), 17 species.

Lincoln's Sparrow, hatching year; a late individual

This photo just to give you an indication on the biting skills of Northern Cardinals!

And as it is my last night here, we are trying for owls! The results so far:

Mad Screech Owl because he got recaptured!

Heather with the cooperative Screech perched on her arm

Saw-whets like getting scratched as you can see!

The Saw-whet was even willing to sit on the head of this Filipino guy/

My first American snowballfight!

That's right. Last night it started snowing.. and it hasn't stopped since! We could open our nets this morning but for some reason the snow got stuck in all the nets and the nets were as droopy as they could get. We decided to close most of our nets and keep the 'feeder' nets open. So the rest of the morning we had about 7 nets open.

After we saw that the nets held on to the snow this badly, we closed most of them immediately.

Last night, while failing to catch any owls, we decided to order a Big Town Pizza again! They're so enormous!

Nice!

With the 7 nets open we caught some birds. About 33 in total of which 22 were new. Spread over 7 species.

Sorry, but I can't resist to post another picture of these fabulous Fox Sparrows:

Fox Sparrow in the snow!

Brandon didn't bring gloves, so he used bird bags. Such a smart guy!

After the short banding session we had a real snowballfight!We had so much fun, as you can probably see in the photos below!

Thanks to Mary, for taking all these photos,

 After hitting Brandon 3 times in the face, he figured he would go after me..

 This was the second hit in the face!

He could barely walk.

 Yup, Brandon was about to go down.

 Here he is, K.O.

 Drew a.k.a the Baseballer trying to hit me.

 In action

 Heather watch out!!

 Drew poaching snowballs from Brandon's fortress.

 Heather vs. Faba

 Heather vs. Brandy

Heather vs. Drew vs. Brandon