I want to get people to start looking up at that bird and say, 'I know what you do now. I know where you travel. They're a good indicator of the overall health of an ecosystem, she said. If the birds start to die off, we've got a problem. Banding birds is one way scientists track bird migrations.
Bands have an individual identification number and a contact address.
Each time a bird is caught, trained technicians can determine where and when that bird was captured and released, often attaching a new band which others may see in the future. Finely meshed nets, called mist-nets, are used to catch birds in flight. The net mesh varies in gauge depending on the size of bird to be captured, so that its strength is appropriate to keep the bird from breaking through or injuring itself upon impact. Trained technicians carefully disentangle birds, then weigh and measure them, and often band them before release. Shorebirds, such as these sandpipers, migrate in huge flocks sometimes numbering in the tens of thousands.