Bird Banding

Banding is the most common way of marking birds for identification purposes. It is necessary in breeding and is taken into consideration by NFSS for judgment of the bird on bird shows. The gold standard of banding is numbered closed bands. It can be carried out only when chicks are in the very early age. The closed numbered band assures that the bird was raised in certain breeder and in certain year, some additional information can be included. NFSS sells color coded by year closed bands of different sizes.

The most appropriate time for banding chicks is when they are about 8-days old. A closed band can be slid over the leg of chicks younger than eight days. If a chick is a day or two older than the rest, larger bands of the next size should be used. Sometimes the parents notice the colorful new addition on the chick’s foot and try to pick it off. To minimize this reaction, we band late in the day and check the next morning to make sure the chicks are still in the nest and the bands remain on.

The procedure of banding is rather delicate and required from breeder some hand on experience to be accomplished successfully.

For routine marking birds, it is acceptable also to use open colored plastic bands that are available at the bird stores. On contrary to closed bands, marking with open color bands is easier, can be done in adults and, therefore, is useful for visual identification of males vs. females. The bands of one color help to distinctively mark at least three birds (Sample, 1-3 rows); the bands of two colors provide combinations for marking eight birds (1-8 rows).