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RFI: Color-marked Hummingbirds
- To: carolinabirds@duke.edu (CAROLINA BIRDS)
- Subject: RFI: Color-marked Hummingbirds
- From: "BILL HILTON JR. (Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History)"<hilton@hiltonpond.org>
- Date: Mon, 3 Apr 2000 12:04:23 -0400
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
The first Ruby-throated Hummingbird of the year put in an appearance
at Hilton Pond Center this morning (4 April 2000) and was
subsequently banded and color-marked. Thus, I am posting my annual
request for observers to be on the lookout for color-marked RTHU.
Please post and forward the following announcement to appropriate
recipients.
**************
--REQUEST for INFORMATION about SIGHTINGS of COLOR-MARKED HUMMINGBIRDS --
Spring migration of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris)
is under way in the northcentral Piedmont of South Carolina. As part
of Operation RubyThroat, Bill Hilton Jr. has been banding
hummingbirds since 1984 at Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural
History near York, South Carolina (southwest of Charlotte, North
Carolina). Although the Piedmont seems NOT to be a hummingbird
migrational pathway or staging area, through 1999 Hilton still
managed to capture and band 2,120 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (RTHU),
and retrapped many of them in subsequent years after banding.
To minimize recapture of banded hummingbirds in his pull-string
traps, Hilton is authorized by the federal Bird Banding Lab to mark
each bird from York with non-toxic GREEN dye on the upper breast and
throat. (In fact, he uses a so-called "permanent" felt-tip marker,
but the dye wears or washes off within a month or so.) Hilton also
bands RTHUs at other locations, using BLUE or BROWN dye.
Because we know little about actual overland migrational pathways for
hummingbirds, observers are asked to report any sightings they may
have of color-marked hummingbirds during migration in the spring of
2000.
Color-marking of RTHUs at Hilton Pond paid off in October 1991 when a
woman in Atlanta saw an "unusual" hummingbird with a green throat and
called Bob Sargent, a fellow hummingbird bander from Alabama. Bob
went to Atlanta, trapped the bird, and after reading the band number
learned it had been banded in South Carolina at Hilton Pond just 10
days before. This was the first banded RTHU ever to be recaptured and
released more than 10 miles away from its original banding site.
In Fall 1997, Judy Fruge of Cameron in southwestern Louisiana sighted
another "green-throated" hummingbird that was likely a RTHU banded at
Hilton Pond; this sighting further supports the idea that at least
some East Coast RTHU migrate not to south Florida but to the Texas
Gulf Coast before a trans-Gulf or Mexican overland crossing. This
bird may have been the first "long-distance" sighting of a marked
RTHU. Another green-marked bird was seen in September 1999 east of
Charlotte NC about 30 miles from Hilton Pond.
If you see a color-marked hummer, do not attempt to trap it (it's
against federal law to do so unless you have a special permit), but
please contact Operation RubyThroat and Bill Hilton Jr. via e-mail
<hilton@rubythroat.org> or by phone at (803) 684-5852. If you find a
dead banded bird, read the band number and contact both Operation
RubyThroat and the federal Bird Banding Lab at 1-800-327-BAND or via
their reporting website page at
http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/bbl/homepage/recwbnd.htm.
Thank you for any help you can provide in taking close looks at
hummingbirds at your feeders during the spring of 2000, and please
pass this information to other persons interested in hummingbirds. A
wealth of information about hummingbirds is available at the
Operation RubyThroat website: http://www.rubythroat.org and at the
website for Hilton Pond Center: http://www.hiltonpond.org .
Happy Hummingbird Watching!
**********
BILL HILTON JR., "The Piedmont Naturalist"
Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History
1432 DeVinney Road
York, South Carolina 29745
USA
e-mail: <hilton@hiltonpond.org>
Voice: (803) 684-5852
eFax: (503) 218-0845
Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History is a 501(c)(3)
non-profit research and education organization, so all in-kind or
monetary gifts to Operation RubyThroat and the Center are
tax-deductible. Please visit our websites:
Hilton Pond: <http://www.hiltonpond.org>
Operation RubyThroat: <http://www.rubythroat.org>
"Never trust a person too lazy to get up for sunrise or too busy to
watch the sunset."
BHjr.
**********