At a stronghold for Purple Martins, volunteers and staff band 89 baby birds

Kailyn Lundeberg of the CT DEEP uses a photo guide to determine the ages in days, of a young Purple Martin at the Coastal Center as two summer campers watch. Coastal Center Director Ken Elkins took the photo.

In the sanctuaries …
July 17, 2023 — Young Purple Martins make a squawking noise that sounds like what the movies imagine a pterodactyl might sound like — harsh, insistent, un-birdlike — only not as loud.

That’s how some of the nestlings at the Milford Point Coastal Center were expressing themselves the other morning during the center’s annual Purple Martin banding session. Volunteers and staff from Connecticut Audubon and the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection were carefully removing the young birds, nest by nest, attaching tiny identification bands to the birds’ legs, and then placing them back in the nests.

The Purple Martins tolerate it but the older nestlings especially — the oldest on this morning was 26 days — make it known that they’d rather be doing something else. The process is harmless though, and the leg bands often yield useful information about bird movements and migration.

For years Purple Martins were listed as a threatened species in Connecticut. But within the last decade that status changed to species of special concern to reflect the birds’ increased population.

Connecticut Audubon will examine that change in detail in an article about Purple Martins in Connecticut and beyond for our 2023 Connecticut State of the Birds report later this year.  For now though we want to report that the Coastal Center colony, one of the largest in the state, is thriving.

Purple Martins live only in man-made houses like the “gourds” alongside the marsh at Milford Point.

The CT DEEP staff works at a banding table under a canopy for shade. Photo by Frank Mantlik.

This year, the Coastal Center colony has 30 active nests with 109 chicks. The birds’ success is almost 100% the result of three things:

• The support of Connecticut Audubon members, whose donations go directly toward conservation projects like this one, carried out by our conservation staff.
• The 35 Coastal Center supporters who in 2023 made special donations to “adopt” gourds.
• And the people who volunteer to care for the gourds and check the nests each week of the season. They’re led by Frank Mantlik and include George Amato, Lori Romick, Beverly Propen, Tom Murray, Gilles Carter.

They were there one morning last week, working among the tall reeds in stifling humidity — opening each gourd, transferring each baby bird into dark soft containers, and carrying the containers to a table set up under a canopy for shade.

Three Connecticut Audubon staffers worked with them — habitat manager Stefan Martin and two of Milford Point’s Coastal Rangers, Matt Joyce and Johann Heupel.

Under the canopy, four state DEEP staff members compared each birds’ plumage to pictures in a printed guide, to determine exactly how many days old they were, and then placed the bands around the birds’ legs. An aluminum band is inscribed with a number than can identify the birds if it’s found later, and an orange bands indicates that it was banded at Milford Point.

The banded Purple Martins ranged from 9 to 26 days old. Photo by Frank Mantlik.

Coastal Center Director Ken Elkins brought over three or four youngsters at a time from summer camp to get a close view of the banding process and, with the DEEP staffers gently holding the birds, to feel the birds’ feathers.

After each bird had its age and band number recorded in a log book, the DEEP staff placed it back in its container for the short walk back to the gourds, to be reunited with anxious parents.

Of the 109 young Purple Martins at the site, 89 were banded. Chicks younger than 9 or 10 days are too small for banding.

This year marks at least the eighth year of Purple Martin banding at Milford Point (with a year off in 2020 because of the pandemic). It’s a stronghold for this beautiful species, and one that wouldn’t exist were it not for the support of Connecticut Audubon members and volunteers.

You can see the birds for yourself from the observation platform off the Coastal Center’s parking lot. They’re generally around well into August before they migrate south. If you visit, stand quietly and listen for the sound of tiny pterodactyls.