Jack Miner banding a duck in Ontario in 1909; news from South Carolina the following year revealed where it had travelled

A metal band placed around a duck's leg in Ontario in 1909 ended up telling a much bigger story. Jack Miner had marked his first mallard, Katie, with his name and address. A year later, news from South Carolina revealed that the same bird had travelled hundreds of miles from where Miner had first banded it. This simple recovery became the first complete record of where a bird had been banded and where it was later shot on the North American continent. It also placed Jack Miner among the earliest people to use bird banding for scientific investigation, as per a report by Jack Miner Migratory Bird Sanctuary and Ducks Unlimited.

How Did One Banded Duck Make History?

Jack Miner founded his bird sanctuary in Kingsville, Ontario, in 1904 as a refuge for migratory birds. Five years later, he began experimenting with bird banding.


In 1909, Miner banded his first mallard and named her Katie. The metal band carried his name and address, creating a way for anyone who later found the bird to report where she had been. That happened on January 10, 1910.

Dr. W. E. Bray of Anderson, South Carolina, shot Katie and reported the band. The information created a complete record linking the original banding location with the bird's later location.

For Miner, the band was more than an identifying mark. It became a way to follow the movements of migratory birds and gather information about where they travelled.

What Happened After Katie?

Miner continued developing the banding program at the sanctuary. In 1915, he began banding Canada geese with numbered aluminum bands. These bands carried Miner's name, a biblical verse and the instruction, “Write Box 48, Kingsville, Ontario!”

The sanctuary's banding tradition eventually grew considerably. By 1944, 50,000 wild ducks and 40,000 Canada geese had been banded there.

Duck and goose bands from the Jack Miner Bird Sanctuary later became collectibles, with the early Miner bands particularly treasured.

The sanctuary continues banding migratory waterfowl today.

How Does Bird Banding Work at the Sanctuary?

The modern process still depends on careful preparation and supervision. The sanctuary uses three permanent banding nets, selected according to the areas where birds gather. Before birds are caught, the net area is prepared with water at the appropriate depth and bait to attract the waterfowl. The bands are prepared beforehand by being rolled into a C shape so they can be placed quickly.

When a bird is caught, one of the banders holds its wings carefully to avoid injury. The bird is then sexed, meaning the banders determine whether it is male or female. Ducks are generally easier to sex than geese because of their colouring.

The aluminum band is placed around the bird's leg and closed into a D shape. It must remain loose enough that it does not rub or hurt the bird, while still being secure enough that it will not fall off or rotate.

Only migratory waterfowl, including ducks and geese, are banded at the sanctuary, and birds that already have bands are not given another one because they may belong to a different research project.

Once the information has been recorded, the bird is released. A licensed bander must be present throughout the process to oversee the work, ensure accurate records and make sure the birds remain healthy and unharmed.

What Can a Recovered Band Reveal?

When someone recovers a band, its information is submitted through the sanctuary's form and added to its database. People can also request a certificate containing additional information about the band. The system has produced some remarkable records over the years.

A black duck drake, for example, was captured 18 times in Michigan Department of Conservation waterfowl banding traps over a nine-year period. The adult bird was first trapped and banded in 1949 and continued avoiding hunters and predators for years. When it was caught again on January 31, 1958, its original band had become worn with age and was replaced.

Some recoveries have been considerably stranger. According to a winter 1957 Ducks Unlimited Quarterly item, Wyoming fish and game personnel had tagged trout and banded a merganser. A California biologist later obtained the merganser after it was shot by a hunter. Inside the bird's stomach was a tag from one of the Wyoming trout.

How Far Can a Banded Bird Travel?

One pintail demonstrated just how much distance a migratory bird could cover. The bird was banded on September 2, 1940, in northern Alberta's Athabasca County. It survived until January 1954, when it was shot near Naucuspana, Tabasco, Mexico.

The distance between the banding site and where the bird was recovered was about 3,000 miles. Assuming the pintail completed the two-way migration every year for 13 years, it would have travelled nearly 80,000 migration miles during its lifetime.

Other recoveries have been remarkable for completely different reasons.

On November 23, 1996, Howard Ewart shot two mallard drakes while hunting on the Big Horn River near Thermopolis, Wyoming. Both carried bands, and both were recovered on the same day.

Jack Needles had a similar experience on December 24, 1992, when he shot a drake black duck and a hen mallard near Stone Harbor, New Jersey. The birds had arrived as a pair.

What Are the Odds of Finding Consecutive Bands?

Dr. Stan Chace of Alturas, California, encountered an especially unusual pair of recoveries in 1962. While home from school on vacation in October, Chace shot a banded Canada goose. Two months later, in December, he shot another.

When he compared the bands, he discovered that they were consecutively numbered: 518-31661 and 518-31662. Both birds had been banded in 1959 at Goose Lake.

From one duck in Ontario to a growing record of migratory waterfowl, Jack Miner's banding work created a way to connect individual birds with the places they visited.

Katie's recovery in South Carolina in 1910 was the first complete North American record of a bird being traced from its banding location to its later recovery. What began with a name, an address and a small metal band became an early chapter in the scientific study of bird movements.

Source: Jack Miner Migratory Bird Sanctuary; Ducks Unlimited Quarterly, Winter 1957

FAQs

Who was Katie?

Katie was the mallard Jack Miner banded in Ontario in 1909. She was later shot by Dr. W. E. Bray in South Carolina in January 1910.

Why was Katie's recovery important?

It created the first complete North American record connecting a bird's banding location with where it was later recovered.