Idaho Bird Observatory: Part 3

While not the first “official” day of fall, the weekend of September 16th certainly felt like it. Temperatures up at Lucky Peak did not get out of the 60s after temperatures had consistently been in the 80s all September. Friday night up on the mountain got down to the low 40s, providing a crisp Saturday morning of songbird and raptor trapping. Friday was a slow day of trapping as a cold front had just moved through and migration numbers at IBO are typically depressed in the days immediately following a low-pressure system (Miller et al 2011). However, my heart was beating through my chest as a juvenile Golden Eagle approached our pigeon lure, pulling out of a stoop and flying off about 10 feet over the lure, so close!! He will not get away next time…

Friday night found myself accompanying IBO owl trapper and bander Jethro, along with a scientific immersion class from Boise State University. Jethro managed to trap a Northern Saw-Whet Owl (pictured below) along with a Flammulated Owl. Jethro has caught 21 Flammulated Owls so far this season (only 3 were caught all last year!), while Northern Saw-Whet migration has just started. IBO is gathering important information on owl migration which is very understudied given the secretive nature of these nocturnal forest dwellers.

Things started to pick up on Saturday as migration resumed it’s daily routine. Sharp-Shinned, Cooper’s and Red-Tailed Hawks were all trapped before I departed the mountain around 4pm. Before leaving, myself, along with fellow graduate student Robert Miller, and IBO Director Greg Kaltenecker (pictured below educating local kids about songbirds) gave several short talks to a group of undergraduate students taking part in an overnight scientific immersion class with Dr. Jen Forbey. I gave a roughly 10 minute talk about the effects of climate change on raptor and songbird migration. These public talks are an important part of what IBO is trying to accomplish in educating the local public about raptor and songbird conservation, and is part of what we hope to convey in our upcoming video collaboration with IBO! Until next week…

Neil Paprocki