Day 17: Nothing but net

Today will be short and sweet because unlike basketball players, ornithologists do not dream of "nothing but net."

A female dobsonfly greeted us this morning. I never realized how large they are.

We only caught six birds today, but one was a neat juvenile veery. 

Other neat things today were catnip and a deer vertebrate. 

Day 16: The NeverEnding bird banding

Chippewa Nature Center has dried up so that mud remains and some trails look like the swamp of sadness from The NeveEnding Story.

The remaining feathers of an unfortunate waterfowl added to the affect.

Today we caught two new birds of the summer:

House wren

Cedar waxwing- we've been waiting to catch one of these for awhile because they're seen flying around often.

Named for their red wax like wing tips.

New catches aren't the only exciting birds. Sometimes it's fun to have bird facial hair show downs. 

Juvenile cardinal five-o-clock shadow

Adult beard

Even the ladies, like this female American redstart- have great whiskers. 

That juvenile with the pubescent facial hair was caught earlier this summer, At the time he had less coloration and a prominent line on his tail feathers that exhibited a period of malnutrition

.

Today I learned that dragonflies have five eyes and that you can determine if one is newly hatched. Their bodies and wings will feel squishy as opposed to older, fully hardened dragonflies. 

Ornithologists bet on birds. We guess at how many species and individuals we will catch with Price Is Right rules. I stick to 11 and 27, which is over optimistic. But today with 12 species and 21 individuals I got the closest I've been this summer. 

Day 15: It's a superman, it's a plane, no it's an indigo bunting!

My repertoire of bird calls has a lot of room for improvement, but I was happy to recognize an indigo bunting singing first thing in the morning. They continued to sing into the day: some marking territories and others practicing. Juvenile birds have squeaky, unsure songs that don't succeed in attracting mates initially.

We caught a female at the end of the day. They aren't brightly colored like the males, but with age they gain more blue as their levels of estrogen and testosterone balance out. 

Beside the bunting and a handful of wood thrush, today's nets were slow. The sky wasn't empty though, a crop duster works in nearby fields most weeks. 

A pretty puff ball mushroom sprouted near our setup site. 

Insects were out and about as always.

Wolf spider

Sawfly larvae overrunning a dogwood tree

A wasp nest right off of the trail, the size of a human head. 

A dragonfly with the wingspan of a small tree.

Day 14: Slobbering woodpecker

When people ask what I do for work, my response ought to be, "I get slobbered on, pooped on and pecked on by birds." I removed a slobbery, saliva-gurgling hairy woodpecker from a net today.

He was trying to squawk but all that came out were spitty noises.

They're barbed tongues are good at extracting bugs from trees and tangling into nets.

Despite the 46 degrees Fahrenheit this morning, it felt good to hike Chippewa and watch the sunrise first thing in the morning.

The dew highlighted the spiderwebs that ring the pond.

And where there are webs, there are spiders. 

Long-jawed orb wever

Spiders weren't the only critters around.

Small wasp

Leopard frog

The water brought all sorts of winged creatures.

Sand piper

Canada geese

Egret

Blue heron

Bat

Hunting juvenile bald eagle

Today's new catches were a pair of warbling vireos and a brown creeper (I like to call it a road runner hummingbird).

Brown creeper

Juvenile warbling vireo

Adult warbling vireo