I’ve spent a fair chunk of the last month in Canada, so these notes may be briefer than usual! But one of the things we did while there was to visit a bird observatory on a promontory (Long Point) projecting into Lake Erie - a great place for seasonal migrants - where birds caught in mist nets were assessed and measured and ringed, or banded as they say there.
Identified too, of course - easy for them, not for me. Almost every Canadian bird (except the geese!) was new and strange, though most of them were common enough really. Mist nets were draped at various points in the wooded reserve - these are very fine nets, and birds fly into them and get caught and tangled. It can be hard to release them sometimes, but the guys there were very gentle, patient and nimble fingered, making sure the birds came to no harm.
The birds caught were then placed into soft bags with drawstrings, and would be comfortable and quiet in these bags for up to two hours, though generally they wouldn’t need to be so long. The only exception to this was the ruby-throated humming bird, the only humming bird to be commonly seen that far north. They need special treatment, and certainly couldn’t cope with two hours in a bag, so are checked over and quickly released.
The birds in bags are taken to a small laboratory where they are identified, recorded and measured and weighed. The weighing machine requires the bird to be sort of stuffed head first into a tube on the scales, not very elegant but they don’t seem to mind too much. Within this process they will also be ringed or banded if they haven’t been already. If they already have a ring, then those details are noted. Finally the bird drops down a little hatch into a space from which it can thankfully fly away.
Birds caught while I was there included black-and-white warbler, American redstart, field sparrow, black-capped chickadee, magnolia warbler and Swainson’s thrush - plus a catbird which was the only one to be at all vocal - and the humming bird I mentioned earlier. All were safely released.
Work like this goes on all round the world, and helps us understand the migration of birds, their habits and seasonal or year by year variations in numbers. The more we understand, the better we can offer protection and support to our precious bird populations. Of course, no-one is allowed to use mist nets and other bird trapping equipment without special licence and full instruction, and the information gained is shared openly and fully. I felt privileged to have been able to see this important work, and to see a few of the local birds at close quarters.
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