I can catch birds!

As I will likely being doing often, I woke up before the sun, around 4:50 AM. I met Julian and Dr. Levey at 6 and we set out with our mist netting equipment. We was gonna get us a bird. We put the net up in a clear cut area, set up the Ipod, and before we got 10 feet away, we already had a male indigo bunting. Dr. Levey showed me how to safely remove a bird from the net, without damaging either entity. We plucked a tail feather so another one would grow, and the new one can be analyzed because it will reflect what the bird ate while it's here, not while it was migrating. Then Julian showed me how to collect blood, by poking a needle in the brachial vein beneath the wing. When we have capillary tubes, they'll just suck that blood right up as it comes out.

We let the little guy go, but we had left the Ipod on, so when we checked the net again we had snared his mate. She's not the beautiful deep turquoise blue like him, just tan, with a wee bit of blue on her wings. And I took her out of the net. I did! Me! My first bird! It was a special moment. We went through the motions again, Julian practicing bleeding on one wing, and me on the other. We also checked for a brood patch, when all the feathers fall off her breast so she can incubate eggs better. And she had one, which means she's nesting. So we let her go.

But disaster struck! She didn't fly away like her mate, she kinda hopped away, then just stood and wobbled. I was so scared I injured her and felt really bad, but we caught and checked her and everything looked good. Dr. Levey hypothesized that since it was early, her blood sugar might be low, and we'd just stressed her out. Normally, we should carry glucose solution for times like this, which are rare, but we didn't have any. BUT, I remembered I had a fruit cup in my lunch, which I left in the truck. I ran to get it, and Dr. Levey began to put drops of the juice on her beak so she could drink it. This went on for a while, and when her eyes opened a bit more (she shut them halfway, a sign of stress), we put her down. She continued to wobble a bit, but then she hopped on a branch and flapped, and a few minutes later she was flying. Hooray!
I saved a bird! Me! I sacrificed part of my lunch for her! I'm a hero!

After that ordeal, we just watched birds for a while while our binoculars, learning to identify them. Dr. Levey pointed out a Yellow-breasted Chat, which has a bright yellow breast (duh) and a wide range of songs. It's interesting because no one knows how to classify it. It's a warbler, but it's hardly like a warbler at all, way too big. Anyway, we decided to catch it, which was successful. No bleeding and stuff, but fun anyway.

After that, we looked for cuckoos and headed back to station. We hung out, then went to meet someone in the field, to talk, eat, and check for birds. Returned to station, Dr. Levey left, and Julian took Candice and I out to set up nets for the next morning. We can keep them twisted up over night, then spread them out in the morning without having to set up the poles again. Candice hadn't handled birds yet, so we caught a male bunting in one of the nets. We had a little trouble with an unsteady pole falling down, but I dealt with that while Julian taught her stuff. She called the bird "Bundt Cake." Cute.

It was later than I'd hoped, so I left pretty fast when we got to station. Skyped as usual, kept Beck up too long. Showered, made pasta, wrote blog, got tired, went bed, wake when no sun, Matt come tomorrow, need clean, birds. Ug.