Fourth Weekend of Banding 2026

Hello All,

This is my fourth report of the 2026 banding season, covering the weekend of September 25th, 2026.

This is our 57th consecutive season of trapping raptors on the Mattson’s hay field!!!

Rick and I met up at Hawk Harbor Thursday afternoon thinking we would get the nets set up that evening. A constant drizzle caused us to change our minds and instead, we drove in to Two Harbors for a nice dry supper at Culvers.

Friday, September 25th

Friday morning we loaded up the banding gear in Rick‘s truck and went out to the banding station. We got everything all set up and ready to start at 7:30 am. The rain from the night before had stopped, but the winds were predicted to be light out of the east-north-east or east! Not good for migration at our site.

We sat there looking at an empty sky for 3 hours without seeing a hawk. At 10:30 am we spotted a shin that was circling up over the trees north of us. Rick worked the lure and it came right in. Our first bird of the day was a young male Sharp-shinned hawk. All day long we saw a few shins coming over the blind, but they just kept on going past. We saw some eagles and lots of ravens, but not many other hawks.

A couple more hours passed without any takers until we saw a male American Kestrel come stooping into the field from the north. It was going for the fake owl! Once it realized its mistake, it saw the lure and decided to take a shot at that instead. That was the only other bird we banded that day, so we closed down at 3:30 pm and headed back down to Hawk Harbor.

Mattie and his dad Glen were trapping farther up the shore at Mattie‘s site and had brought their new camper trailer to Hawk Harbor for the weekend. Curt was also up at his trapping site and had Amber and Brynn there to help him. Mattie stopped by the grocery store on his way back from his site and had picked up some food to treat us all to a cookout. We got a nice campfire going and roasted some brats and hot dogs. Thanks, Mattie and Glen!!!

We got a total of 2 birds and had no bounce-outs on Friday.

1 Sharp-shinned hawk, and 1 American Kestrel.

Saturday, September 26th

What can I say, we knew we had had too much good luck a couple weeks before when we broke all our records for birds banded in one day (50). The other side of the luck pendulum came back to hit us on Saturday! Brynn joined Rick and me and we sat in the blind scanning the skies for birds from 7:00 am to 4:30 pm that evening with no birds banded, with not even a bounce out! And, just to poke fun at us, nature sent a Blue Jay into our net at 7:50 am. A Totally Skunked Day!!! Things were so dead that day that a Turkey vulture came by and circled over us to see if we were dead as well.

We got a total of 0 birds and had no bounce-outs on Saturday.

A Skunked Day!

2 total birds for the weekend.

133 total birds for the season.

Rick and I stayed over at Hawk Harbor on Saturday night and then went in for breakfast at Judy’s Café Sunday morning. Rick bought my breakfast as it was my 77^th birthday that day. When I got home, Trudi and I celebrated by going out for dinner at one of our favorite places.

(All birds are humanely captured, banded, and immediately released unharmed under a federal license issued by The U.S. Geological Survey through The Federal Bird Banding Laboratory.)

Please help hawks by supporting:

Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory (www.hawkridge.org)

Midwest Peregrine Society (https://midwestperegrine.umn.edu/)

National Eagle Center (www.nationaleaglecenter.org)

Raptor Resource Project (https://www.raptorresource.org/)

The Raptor Center (www.raptor.cvm.umn.edu)

Twin Cities Metro Osprey Watch (http://ospreywatch.blogspot.com/)

Keep your eyes on the skies!

Trudi & Frank Taylor