Date: 10/26/25 2:59 pm From: David LaPuma <david...> Subject: [JERSEYBI] Hummingbird banding and tracking in New Jersey
Hello Jerseybirders!
Wow..it seems like forever ago that I posted to this list. I just wanted to remind all birders that it’s vagrant hummingbird season (yeah, I know you didn’t need reminding ;) ) but also to let you know that we now have several new hummingbird banders in the state. Most recently that includes Mike Lanzone and his daughter Phoebe Lanzone, both in Cape May. Lena Usyk of Vineland has been certified for several years now, and one of the primary banders at the Cape May Songbird Stopover Project, Steph Bartlett, is also certified to band hummingbirds at the NJAS/TNC/CMBO/CTT banding station at the TNC South Cape May Meadows. All this means that we have a much better capacity to ensure hummingbirds are banded and identified properly in the state of NJ (but we are heavily weighted in the south!). Dr. Cassie Stoddard and her students at Princeton also have hummingbird training and are interested in increasing their coverage in-state, in addition to the hummingbird research they do in Colorado and Virginia.
Another really amazing thing is the development of tiny tracking devices that are perfectly fit for tagging hummingbirds. The CTT BlūMorpho transmitter (made by cellular tracking technologies, the company I work for) weighs 0.06g, or the same as a dry grain of rice, and has been used successfully on Monarch Butterflies as well. This transmitter can be detected on various devices and provides us unprecedented ability to track hummingbirds once released. Myself, Phoebe and Mike have authorization to attach these transmitters to hummingbirds in NJ- so if you are hosting a winter hummingbird we’d be very keen to band, measure, ID, and attach a transmitter to that bird to aid in our understanding of where these birds go and where they come from. As always, any catching, banding, and transmittering is done under both the appropriate federal and state permits.
You can aways reach me by calling or texting my cell number below.
Thanks, and good birding!
David
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David A. La Puma, PhD
Cape May, New Jersey
