Although
May was not especially busy bird-wise, almost 100 visitors signed our
guest book during the month.
On May 3-4, Sandy Teliak, a past banding workshop participant, paid
us a follow-up visit. In the photo below, Pam Ferkett (Bob Mulvihill's
wife) extracts an American Goldfinch as Sandy observes her technique.
Powdermill
banding volunteers, Brooks Bird Club members, and Allegheny Front Migration
Observatory fall banders, Fred (pictured below) and Carol McCullough, stopped
in to give us a hand with the banding several times during the month.
Dr. Michael Collins, Assistant
Professor of Vertebrate Ecology at Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia,
his wife Andy, and their son Daniel visited from May 6-11. Dr. Collins
was unable to attend the Beginning Bander Workshop in April, and so
we scheduled some training for him just ahead of our Advanced Bander
Workshop. Daniel clearly was excited to add American Redstart to his
life list, although he was much less interested in seeing just another
Common Yellowthroat.
Professor David Norman, a Powdermill
Research Associate and ringer from Cheshire, England, has made
many visits to Powdermill in the past, but this was his first
time visiting in May (from 5/7-5/24). This finally gave him
the chance to see a wide variety of Neotropical migrants, like
Scarlet Tanager, in their bright spring plumage.
Apparently,
the brilliant tanager male made quite an impression on Prof.
Norman, who showed up at the banding lab a couple days later
in some scarlet plumage of his own!
Our
Advanced Bander Workshop was held from 5/14-5/18. Pictured from
left to right are Maria Terres (workshopper from Wisconsin), George
Rowsom (from Long Island, NY), Molly McDermott, Matt Shumar, Keith
McKenrick (from north-central PA), David Norman, Bob Mulvihill,
and Bob Leberman.
Another bander-in-training, Melanie
Reichley, came at the end of the month with her family. Pictured
below (left to right) are Melanie, Jake, Bodkin, Dave, and Andie
Reichley. Melanie bands in Maryland at the North Bay environmental
learning center.
Bob
Mulvihill shows a recently netted Louisiana Waterthrush to passers-by
on a trail in Linn Run State Park (near Powdermill) where he and his
interns have studied the species off and on for twelve years.
Rob Slebodnik, one of five Louisiana
Waterthrush interns for 2008, measures the length of the waterthrush's
wing.
Another
Louisiana Waterthrush study intern, Gerardo Rodríguez Ramos, from
Jalisco, Mexico, waits patiently for another waterthrush to fly into
a mist net.
We enjoyed our annual visit from
students at St. Edmund's Academy in Pittsburgh on 5/9.
A group from Ohiopyle State Park
came on 5/10 as part of an outing organized in celebration of
International Migratory Bird Day.
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Frank
Lucchino, a Trustee of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, and his family visited
the banding lab on 5/17.
The Lucchino kids and some other
young visitors had fun seeing many kinds of birds...
small ones
and BIG ones!
As part of a Penn State Public Broadcasting fundraiser, Julie Cleland bid
on a special Powdermill bird banding demonstration for her family on 5/18.
Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Conservation
Interns visited the Powdermill banding lab on 5/20. From left
to right: Dana Owen (from PA), Manuel Gonzalez (from Guatemala), Geoffrey
Ongeri (from Kenya), Alexandra Schnurr (from Germany), Dan Hinnebusch
(HMS Intern Coordinator, from PA and University of Tennessee), and Marah
Ketter (from PA).
Karen Heasley, Chair of the Snee-Rinehart
Charitable Foundation, got a chance to hold and release a banded Northern
Parula on 5/30.
Thanks to all of the above (and
many more),
whose visits and assistance made the season more enjoyable for us!
Last Updated on 06/18/08 By Molly E. McDermott and
Robert Mulvihill
