Yesterday we had a very large influx of White-throated Sparrows and American Robins as well as numerous waxwings. The surprise was an early Eastern White-crowned Sparrow in that mix. The good news continued into the night when we banded our first of season Northern Saw-whet . The owl was a HY-M (young of the year male) and the poor thing was covered in hippoboscid flies. At least we were able to remove and kill those for him. It's unusual for young males to be the first to appear during migration as young females usually predominate.
Hippobscidae are the louse flies or keds and are obligate parasites of birds and mammals. They appear in many sizes and this bird had over a half dozen removed before release. John and Sue Kestrel Haven -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
