New Resident Male at Yellow Pages
July 17, 2015 - Scarborough - Yellow Pages
Bruce Massey Reports:
Over the past week I have made several trips out to the Yellow Pages nest site to try and confirm the resident adults band numbers. Prompted by Marion’s observations of no appearance or serious defense by Rueben during her site visits and the lack of young this year, I was determined to confirm that both Rueben and Linn were still here and running the territory. I was able to get Linn’s band number earlier in the week, black 91 over green V with a silver USFW band. The male was much more challenging.
On Monday, I was able to get a partial read of the black over green band and knew right away that this was probably NOT Rueben. The adults were also behaving like they were in courtship. I finally got a perfect look at the band and the male is black 54 over green W with a silver USFW band. Tracy contacted a few people in search of his identity and it turns out that he is George, hatched at the North Grand Island bridge in 2013. If he continues to hold this territory then he will be Linn’s new mate for the 2016 season.
We have not seen Rueben at all and have no idea of his current status. We do know that he was from Wisconsin, hatched in 2003 and at 12 he was getting on in years. Many of our older males this year have lost their territories to younger newcomers and it looks like that is the case here. If this occurred at some point during the nesting season (we were all busy at fledge watches and so unable to be on site to witness any changes) that might explain the clutch of eggs that were lost.