Mid-March Mist-netting

12 March 2016
We had enough people to run a good variety of nets this weekend and this gave us a diverse catch. The highlights were four first-year Black-faced Cuckooshrikes in the same net. This is a rather spectacular figure given that the previous total banded was just 11 over 15 years at Herdsman!

First-year Black-faced Cuckooshrike

A trio of Black-faced Cuckooshrikes

Silvereyes and Striated Pardalotes were both present in good numbers. The pardalotes were all first-year birds and most of the Silvereyes that we were able to age were also first-years.


The Inland Thornbill we caught recently was recaptured this weekend in the same area.

Inland Thornbill

Adult (age 2+) Australian Reed-warbler

 
Species - new (retrap)
Australian Reed-warbler - 2
Black-faced Cuckooshrike - 4
Brown Honeyeater - 1
Grey Teal - 1
Inland Thornbill - (1)
Pacific Black Duck - (2)
Rufous Whistler - 1
Silvereye - 19 (1)
Singing Honeyeater - 1
Striated Pardalote - 15
Western Gerygone - 1 (1)
Willie Wagtail - 3 (1)
Total - 48 (6) = 54

Breaking Records in February

Apologies for the lack of recent posts. Here are the last three weeks of banding at Herdsman!

20 Feb 2016
This weekend was rather slow and we only processed four species during the Saturday morning. Surprise numbers of Striated Pardalotes made up for the low numbers of Silvereyes.

Species - New (retrap)
Pacific Black Duck - 1 (1)
Silvereye - 6
Striated Pardalote - 12
Willie Wagtail - 2 (1)
Total - 21 (2) = 23



27 Feb 2016
This Saturday made for an exciting February banding session. We caught good numbers of Silvereyes including 10 recaptures. Many of the Silvereyes first caught in December/January in juvenile plumage are now moulting or have finished moulting into adult dress and are difficult to distinguish from older birds.
A smattering of Australian Reed-warblers was a welcome addition, as was an Inland Thornbill, only the third ever for the Herdsman project.

On another note, for the first time ever the catch exceeded 1000 birds before March (our 'banding year' starts in July and runs until the end of the following June). The total came to 1028 birds on our last banding session for February.

Species - New (retrap)
Australian Reed-warbler - 6
Brown Honeyeater - 1
Inland Thornbill - 1
Pacific Black Duck - 1
Rufous Whistler - 3
Silvereye - 18 (10)
Singing Honeyeater - (1)
Striated Pardalote - 9
Western Gerygone - (1)
Total - 39 (12) =51



5 Mar 2016
Birds were not particularly numerous this weekend (not unusual for the time of year) however we did have a particularly diverse catch this time. 19 birds of an amazing 12 species were processed, highlights being an Australian Magpie, Australian Raven and Magpie-lark which all came from the same net.
Silvereyes were few and far between but we caught a variety of honeyeaters, which have been notable in their absence recently.

Adult Australian Raven

Adult female Australian Magpie

Species - New (retrap)
Australian Magpie - 1
Australian Raven - 1
Brown Honeyeater - 2
Laughing Dove - 1
Magpie-lark - 1
Red Wattlebird - (1)
Silvereye - (2)
Singing Honeyeater - 1
Striated Pardalote - 1
Western Gerygone - 2
Willie Wagtail - 2 (1)
Yellow-rumped Thornbill - (3)
Total - 12 (7) = 19