There has been surprisingly little bycatch this year: we’re more than halfway through the field season and so far we’ve only had two non-juncos fly into our nets. As usual, we took some photos of them and then released them.
Green-tailed Towhee
I love these guys: the red eye, the stripes on the throat, the thick grey bill.
All green on the back.
Mountain Chickadee
These guys are very feisty in the hand. They bite a lot, and they’re really grippy. You can see that his feet are clenched.
Gripping my finger. (Don’t worry, it may look strange to be holding him around the neck but it’s perfectly safe to hold birds in this way. This is called “bander’s grip”. Just don’t try to hold mammals this way!)
Still gripping my finger. Check out his lovely brown eye.
Do you have any idea why less by-catch this year? Do you think local birds are figuring out how to avoid the nets? You are more or less in the same places, right?
We’re in the exact same places, yes. We are netting less, though – focusing more on finding nests instead – but still I’m surprised we haven’t had more bycatch. We’ve had a robin bounce out of the net twice, and several hummingbirds almost fly in (I’m just as glad they didn’t), and a Yellow-rumped Warbler hover inches from the net, checking it for bugs, the cheeky little show-off.
The feisty ones and the cheeky ones just make your day more interesting.