Hello, Tweeters.
Thank you so much for reporting this bird again! It is great to know that he is on a territory. A little history on this bird…he had quite an upbringing. His father was banded in 2013 (YWWX, but is now only WWX as he lost his right yellow band) in the Wenas near the Mud Flats Road as a hatch-year bird (HY). He has bred in the Wenas starting in 2015 (we did not find a breeding attempt in 2014, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen). Last year he was breeding near the Ellensburg-Wenas Road with an unbanded female. Sometime after the eggs hatched, the female disappeared (probably killed by a raptor). He was left to raise the nestlings himself. He fledged 2 nestlings, both males, from this nesting attempt. We caught and banded both in late summer. This bird at the Railroad Ponds was one of his offspring and is banded Orange over Red on the right leg and metal (aluminum numbered band) over white on the left leg. Thus, this bird traveled a minimum straight line distance of about 23 miles! This is quite a good distance for a non-migratory woodpecker.
I thank everyone over the last few weeks who has seen this bird and reported it to us. This is vitally important information for our banding program and the first of "our" birds to be sighted by someone outside the study area! For all in tweeterville, please look carefully at all White-headed Woodpeckers (WHWO) wherever you are in WA and check their legs for bands. You can report the bands to me (email below) or on your ebird lists, starting with the right leg and then the left leg. Even if you only see two colored bands, sometimes that is enough to ID the bird. Every WHWO we band is given a unique color combination, but mated pairs, if we catch them in the same year, are banded the same color combo because we can tell the sexes by plumage. Also, if anyone sees any of our banded birds, or any banded bird for that matter, please fill out a band/color marker resighting report at
https://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/BBL/bblretrv/ . This will enable the bird banding lab to track resighting information in their database, you will receive a certificate stating information on where and when the bird was banded, and I will receive notification that a resighting has occurred. Reporting to the Bird Banding Lab demonstrates to them that banding is still an important endeavor and helps facilitate the continuation of projects like ours.
If others see this Cle Elum bird in subsequent years, report it again to me! That will give us some idea how long it occupies this territory.
Thanks all!
Jeff
Jeff Kozma
TFW Wildlife Biologist
Yakama Nation Fisheries Resource Management
P.O. Box 151
Toppenish, WA 98948
O - 509-865-5121 x 6343
C - 509-945-4926
F - 509-865-6293
e-mail -
kozj at yakamafish-nsn.gov <mailto:
kozj at yakamafish-nsn.gov>
website - <
http://yakamafish-nsn.gov/restore/projects/avian-research-managed-ponderosa-pine-forests-washington> Avian Research in Managed Ponderosa Pine Forests of Washington | Yakama Nation Fisheries
From:
rwlawson at q.com <mailto:
rwlawson at q.com> [mailto:
rwlawson at q.com <mailto:
rwlawson at q.com> ]
Sent: Monday, May 07, 2018 12:03 AM
To:
tweeters at u.washington.edu <mailto:
tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Cc:
kozj at yakamafish-nsn.gov <mailto:
kozj at yakamafish-nsn.gov> ;
joe.brown at q.com <mailto:
joe.brown at q.com>
Subject: White-headed Woodpecker, Railroad Ponds, Cle Elum
Today, Joseph Brown and I birded in the Cle Elum area. We were surprised to see a male White-headed Woodpecker at the Northern Pacific Railroad Ponds, close to the kiosk. I suspect that this is the same individual reported on 21 April by Jordan Gunn. If so, this bird has been in the area a while, and we saw him drumming, so perhaps he is setting up a territory. Interestingly, this woodpecker was color-banded. We couldn't get a good look at the bands; all I could see was white on the left leg (probably including the aluminum BBL band) and red on the right. This must be one of Jeff Kozma's banded birds.
There was plenty of other bird activity at the ponds, even in the middle of the day. A pair of Pygmy Nuthatches is nesting in a new snag, now that the old one has fallen down. A Merlin flew over, and Yellow-rumped Warblers were absolutely everywhere. Later, on Hwy 97, we saw a group of 12 disconsolate-looking Turkey Vultures in the trees, waiting out the rain. But Turkey Vultures always look disconsolate, don't they?
Rachel Lawson
Seattle
rwlawson at q.com <mailto:
rwlawson at q.com>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <
http://mailman11.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20180507/302211fe/attachment.html>