Bird Banding Opportunities with PSBO 2024!
Bird Banding is a research technique that demands a high level of skill, knowledge, and practice. The Puget Sound Bird Observatory is strongly committed to developing well trained researchers who have sufficient experience and opportunity to use bird banding practices in their research. We take bird bander development very seriously at PSBO!
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If you are interested in visiting our stations, or are interested in becoming part of the research team here at PSBO, please get in touch: contact@pugetsoundbirds.org . There are several ways you can get involved with bird research through banding with the Puget Sound Bird Observatory:
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If you are interested in visiting one of the banding projects as an observer, please get in touch here. We occasionally have visiting observers, public days, and open house tours of our banding stations. You will see banders in action and will have the chance to interact with the researchers as they work. You will not be banding birds or participating in the research or handling birds. This is a great place to start if you are new to banding, curious about how bird banding works, or are wondering about whether you are interested in learning how to be part of this type of research.
As an observer...
NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARY
If you are interested in joining the PSBO research team, or would like to visit to help at the station, and have taken our level one banding course, or have the equivalent experience elsewhere, we would welcome you to come out. If you have worked at another banding station, or have a NABC certification, or any other certification (internationally, BTO, Euring, for example), or have run your own station as a grad student or similar, let's talk, we'd be very happy to meet you!
As A FULL bander...
EXPERIENCE REQUIRED
If you are an academic, researcher, grad student, or have questions about our station, methods, or research, please get in touch here. If you have common interests, wish to propose collaboration, look at data sets we have, discuss projects, or just nerd out on birds with us, get in touch! We'd love to chat with you.
As a researcher or academic...
AFFILIATION AND CV PREFERRED
If you feel like you would like to learn to become a bird bander/researcher, and do not have the equivalent of a full basic level banding course under your belt yet, PSBO would love to help you get started. We offer a Level One (Beginner Banding) Course in the late summer/early autumn every year. This course is ideal if you have not banded at all, or are just getting started. The course will cover all that you need to join a banding station, with instruction on extracting, banding, aging, and lots of field experience over five days. A perfect seminar for biology students who wish to acquire practical field experience, birders who want to understand the molt process, and anyone else who wants to participate in real field science. Get in touch, and keep watch on the PSBO website for more information.
AS a nEW BANDER...
NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARY
Banding Courses 2024
Spring has sprung, and so have our plans for this year's bird banding courses!
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We will be offering one course this Spring. It will be a Level 2 Banding Course, and will offer a combination of classroom instruction and coached field practice. See below for more details.
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In the Autumn, we will continue our partnership with Northwest Trek, and are working on dates for another two beginner bander courses. More on this soon, but the likely dates will be Sept. 6. 7. 8 , 14, and 15 near Seattle, and Sept. 27, 28, 29, and Oct. 5 and 6 near Tacoma.
Level 2
Advanced
Banding
This course is the followup for the week long beginner banding course that PSBO and other stations offer.
The main focus of instruction will be on giving banders more hands on experience with extraction and processing birds. It will pick up and elaborate on aging birds, the molt cycles of North American Birds, including patterns beyond passerines, and will target more detailed understanding of the Wolfe Ryder Pyle aging system.
Additionally, this course will introduce what it takes to set up and run a full banding research station.
As with the level one course, the time will be divided between classroom instruction and practical field work practice.
May 17, 18, 19
Morse Wildlife Preserve
Graham, WA.
Three Days of instruction
and fieldwork coaching $400
Beginner bander class 2024
We will offer two sections of the beginner bander course again in 2024. These both will occur at the end of the breeding season (Sept. 6, 7, 8, 14, and 15 near Seattle, and Sept. 27, 28, 29, and Oct. 5 and 6, near Tacoma). This course will teach the basics of beginning as a bander, and all that you'll need to know to join a banding station anywhere in North America. The course is five days long, spread over two weekends, and will teach setting nets, extracting birds, banding and processing birds, and managing data for a banding project. It's a great start if you would like to become a bird banding field researcher and is open to all.
Dates: Sept. 6, 7, 8, 14, and 15 near Seattle, and Sept. 27, 28, 29, and Oct. 5 and 6, near Tacoma
Please always feel like you can get in touch and ask questions. Our research team is guaranteed not to bite, and we believe that as a community of scientists, we all grow stronger through collaboration. Please, reach out and connect with us!
