>Au contraire. The Bird Banding Lab (BBL) is only really interested
>in the band numbers used. There is no requirement to record any
>information on the bird being banded other than the species and the
>age and sex if possible - even this is optional but I'd imagine the
>folks at the Lab would frown of you only included species on a
>regular basis.

That's about right. In our case, the only reason we take full
measurements on sharpies is for practice and training. We sex
and age them, and take a couple of other measurements of interest
the the person running the project, that's it if we're at all
busy. The BBL doesn't care as long as they're aged and sexed.

The BBL apparently does some processing of the minimal data we
submit, as they occasionally have caught mis-recorded birds
(i.e. a #2 band recorded for a female coop, that kind of thing).

That's it, though, and that is probably sporadic, and they may pay
more attention to raptor banders.

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <donb at rational.com>