Owl Banding – Midseason Update

The North Branch Nature Center’s second season of Northern Saw-whet Owl banding is underway. In collaboration with other owl researchers around the U.S. and Canada, we are operating banding stations in Montpelier and Shelburne to track the fall migration of these incredible birds. While it is still early in the banding season, we have already learned that this year is going to be very different than last.

In 2013, the banding station in Shelburne showed the rate of hatch-year birds we encountered to be only 11%. Hatch year birds are those born during the most recent breeding season. This low rate of occurrence typically signifies a poor breeding season where not many Saw-whet Owls were fledged. So far in 2014, 87% of the birds encountered in Shelburne had been hatch year birds, which suggests that this year's breeding season was much better than last, with high productivity.

This weekend’s public demonstrations in Montpelier and Shelburne were attended by roughly 80 people. We caught and released a total of 9 owls in Montpelier on Saturday and 2 in Shelburne on Sunday. If you are interested in visiting the banding station, please email Larry. And, please consider supporting our banding project by adopting an owl.

Learn more about NBNC’s Saw-whet Banding program.