African mystery surrounds Welsh-born osprey

No signal from Leri since OctoberJanuary 2012: Mystery surrounds the whereabouts of a young female osprey that migrated with her two brothers from their nesting home in Mid Wales to Africa .

Three young ospreys are all satellite tagged but the female, named Leri by staff at the Dyfi Osprey Project near Machynlleth where she hatched, have not received a signal from the transmitter in Senegal since late October last year.

Dyfi Osprey Project manager Emyr Evans and his colleagues at Montgomeryshire Wildlife Trust (MWT) are keeping their fingers crossed that the tracker transmitter has developed a fault and that she is still alive. 

'We're hoping it's just a faulty transmitter'‘Leri's transmitter was sending back confusing and conflicting data before it stopped working,' explained Mr Evans. ‘We hope it's a case of a faulty transmitter rather than something happening to Leri.'

Wildlife workers in Senegal are keeping a close watch out for Leri and her brother, Einion, who has also made his home in the country. Transmitters on both Einion and his brother Dulas, who is in neighbouring Gambia, are sending data back to Wales regularly.

The ospreys were satellite tagged in partnership with the BBC's Springwatch and Autumnwatch programmes, which are using the neighbouring RSPB's Ynyshir Reserve as their broadcasting base in Wales .

Leri's parents are soon due back in WalesThe three young birds, the first to hatch alongside the River Dyfi since 1604, are not expected to return to Wales until 2013 when they will be mature enough to breed. In the meantime, their fortunes will be closely followed by the transmissions thousands of miles away in Africa .

Their parents, Monty and Nora, are expected to fly back to Wales this spring, with the Dyfi Osprey Project preparing to reopen on March 30. Last year, Monty arrived at Cors Dyfi Reserve, Derwenlas on April 6 and the first chick, Einion, hatched in June.

‘Because he bred last year, we are hoping he will come back a little earlier this spring,' said Mr Evans. MWT has created a new website with regular blogs for each of the ospreys at http://www.dyfiospreyproject.com for people wishing to receive the latest news about them.

Visitors to the Dyfi Osprey Project are able to see live, high resolution nest camera footage at the visitor centre on large plasma screens and view the resident wildlife from a specially built tower-hide with telescopes and binoculars.

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/osprey-leri.html

GPS trackers find migrating cuckoos in same spot

Scientists amazed after five migrating cuckoos fitted with GPS trackers meet up in the same spot in Africa


Scientists have been left astonished after five cuckoos who headed south from Britain for the winter have congregated in the same little-known part of Africa.


British conservationists decided to track their movements to find out more about the birds' lifestyles following concerns about their dwindling numbers.

After leaving East Anglia in June, the birds - Clement, Kasper, Martin, Chris and Lyster - flew thousands of miles apart as they made their way to warmer climes.

Three of the birds, Chris, Martin and Kasper, flew down through Italy and straight across the Sahara desert.

The other two, Clement and Lyster, went to Spain and down the Atlantic edge of the continent, more than 1,000 miles to the west.

Yet now it's been discovered they are all now relatively close, in the Congo rainforest, despite having travelled around 3,000 miles south.

Incredibly, three are about as close to each other as they were when they were caught in Norfolk and Suffolk in May and June.

Experts said their journey was fraught with danger with crossing the Sahara was one of the major sources of mortality for many migrants.

Read more at:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2078783/Scientists-amazed-migrating-cuckoos-fitted-GPS-trackers-meet-spot-Africa.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

First BTO Cuckoo crosses the Equator

All 5 cuckoos now in Central Africa
October 2011. Kasper has become the first of the 5 cuckoos that BTO are tracking to cross the Equator and he is now the most southerly Cuckoo! Having moved rapidly south, by the morning of 23 October, he was in the savannas of southern Congo, about 50km north of the capital Brazzaville. He seems to have taken a route that minimises the distance across the rainforest.

Is Congo their final destination?
Meanwhile, Lyster, despite being the last Cuckoo to leave the UK, has leap-frogged Clement and is now further south than both him and Martin! Having left Burkina Faso, Lyster was located in southern Nigeria on the 24 October, and has now travelled along the western edge of Cameroon, in to Gabon (see orange route on maps). Kasper also stopped in Gabon for four days before moving in to Congo. Lyster is now in the massive area that is the Congo rainforest, in which Kasper, Martin and Chris are also located. Kasper and Chris though, are in Congo itself, while Martin is in the Central African Republic. Clement remains in Nigeria.

Read on ...