A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Mist Net

I am not a “bird nerd.” So, why in the world would I go on an educational trip to the Amazon rain forest where one of the study topics was birds? That’s a question I often asked myself as I tromped through the forest looking for birds. The answer?  Well, I like adventure. I like to learn new things. I needed college credit hours, and so all those things brought me to the forest to study birds. I learned a lot about birds in just a week...more than I ever thought I could.


On the first day of the trip, my group and I dove right into our learning activities, and one of the first things we did was to set up mist nets. A mist net is a long net that is used to catch birds in the wild. The birds can't see the nets, so they fly right into them. It doesn't hurt the birds to be in mist nets, but the person removing the birds has to be careful. Only our professors, Ursula and Jose removed birds from the nets.


Once the nets were set up, we checked them about every 45 minutes. Once a bird was caught in a net, it was removed and placed into a special bag. Ursula assured us that the bags did not harm the birds and that being in the bags helped to calm them. We then took the birds back up to the main lodge to be tagged.


The tagging process involved several tasks because one of our goals was to identify the types of birds we caught. So, all the birds were weighed and measured. Measuring involved the length of the beaks, legs, and wings. The colors and markings of the birds were also observed. Sometimes it was difficult to identify the birds because many of them looked similar. Ursula and Jose identified quite a few of the birds, but the rest of us typically had to look them up in a book, such as The Birds of Peru. After all the observations were made and noted, tags were placed on the bird's legs. The tags were tiny because birds don't weigh much. To place heavy tags on birds would greatly interfere with their ability perform needed tasks.

I'm in my gear and watching birds!

After the tags were on, the birds were ready to be released. The birds were held in such a way that they could simply fly away when they were ready. We were told not to give the birds a toss or a push because the ones who had been struggling during the tagging process might be weakened. If we tossed them, they could fall to the ground and be injured. Most of the birds we tagged were happy to get away from us, though.


Another learning activity during the trip was listening to birds and identifying them by their calls. I would like to say that I got really good at doing it, but that would be an exaggeration. By the end of the trip I could pick out about five birds every time by their calls. At the start of the trip, I couldn't do any, so I felt successful in this venture.

Up until I went on this trip, I thought being an animal researcher was all excitement and danger. In some cases, I’m sure it is. However, I also learned that it can be mundane. This became evident on the day my group sat at the bird researcher’s station at the clay lick.

The clay lick is where birds come to eat clay, which helps aid in their digestion. Our task was to spend three hours watching the clay lick and making notes about the activity we saw there. Well, as our luck would have it, just about the time that we took over the duties, there weren’t any birds at the clay lick. For three hours we sat and waited, but we didn’t see anything. Then the bugs descended on us and decided we were good for a snack. It got so bad at one point that we all resorted to wearing mosquito net hats. We looked ridiculous and had a great laugh about it. However, it didn’t change the fact that we had no birds to observe. On occasion, we studied birds in nearby trees. We saw some excellent blue and gold macaws, but they didn’t go back to the clay lick.

I was relieved when the regular researchers returned, and we got to relinquish our bird researching duties. I concluded that patience is one of the key attributes of a good bird watcher. Patience and a lot of bug spray.

A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush, or in This Case, a Mist Net

One of the focuses of our work in the Amazon was birds. I will readily admit, I am not very knowledgeable about birds. I like to observe them, but not necessarily touch them. However, on this trip I had an open mind and was ready to learn. I learned a lot about birds in just a week...more than I ever thought I could.


We were fortunate to have Ursula as one of our professors, and I was amazed at the amount of knowledge she had about birds. With a PhD in Ornithology, she should know a lot, but I enjoyed how the information just seemed to roll right off of her. She was excited about birds and it genuinely showed. I don't think she succeed in turning me into a "bird nerd," but I did learn a lot from her.


One of the first things we did on this trip was to set up some mist nets. A mist net is a long net that is used to catch birds. The birds can't see the net, so they fly right into it and get caught. It doesn't hurt the bird, but the person removing the bird does have to be careful. Only Ursula, Jose (our other professor), and Raoul (one of the workers at CECCOT) removed the birds from the nets. The rest of us just watched.


We did get to help set up the nets, though, and then about every 45 minutes we went to check them. Amazingly, we did catch a few birds (and a bat...see my earlier post about bats). Once a bird was caught in the net, a knowledgeable person would remove it and place it in a special bag. Ursula assured us that the birds were fine in the bags and that being in the bags actually helped to calm the birds down. We then took the birds back up to the main lodge to be tagged.


The tagging process actually entailed several things. It was more than just tagging. The bird was weighed and measured. Measuring involved the length of the beak, the legs, and the wings. The colors and markings of the bird were also observed. The eventual goal was to be able to identify the type of bird. Ursula knew many of the birds, but the rest of us typically had to look them up in a book. The Birds of Peru was the book we used to try and identify the birds. Sometimes it was very difficult because many of the birds looked very similar with just slight differences in appearance. After all the observations were made and noted, tags were placed on the bird's legs. The tags were very tiny. They had to be because birds don't weigh very much. To place heavy tags on the birds would greatly interfere with their ability to do what they need to do in order to survive.


After the tags were on, the bird was ready to be released. The bird was held in such a way that it could simply fly away when it was ready. We were told not to give the bird a toss or a push because some of the birds who had been struggling during the tagging process might be weakened. If we tossed them, they could fall to the ground and be injured. Most of the birds we tagged were happy to get away from us. No injured birds during these tagging sessions!


Another thing we did was to listen to birds and try to identify them by their calls. I would like to say that I got really good at doing it, but that would be an exaggeration. By the end of the trip I could pick out about five birds every time by their calls. At the start of the trip, I couldn't do any, so I would consider this some success. Some of the birds I could identify by call at the end of the trip were the oropendola and the macaws. The oropendola also does a really cool "show." (Watch for a video that I will post later.) The macaws are very loud, and I thought their calls were quite easy to identify.

All in all, I do not think I will ever be a bird expert, or a "bird nerd," as Ursula liked to say. However, I feel pretty pleased with the amount of knowledge I now possess about the birds of Peru. Like a good student, I learned something! It's amazing how much there still is to know about this wonderful world.