Sweco's Journey to Mexico.

Sweco left the Great Salt Lake a little over a week ago. He made a stop at Tremaine Lake in Arizona on the 27th of October before making it to Mexico on the 28th. He had a short stay near Guaymas, Mexico before moving further south to the state of Sinaloa where he remains.

Clara now in Mexico!

On October 6, Clara was detected in Mexico.  She is now located south of Puerto Peñasco in Sonora Mexico.  Her last signal from Great Salt Lake came just before midnight on October 2.  Fifty two hours later we received a signal from her in Mexico over 720 miles away.  Because the transmitters only send out signals to satellites for five hours, followed by a 20 hour off-cycle, we don’t know her exact time of departure.  However, for birds that can travel 30-50 miles per hour, a 700 mile flight could be accomplished in as little as 14 hours.  She continues to slowly move south along the coast of Mexico.

The other birds continue to provide signals at Great Salt Lake within Farmington Bay.

First migration report

Yesterday morning (September 30, 2014) we received an excellent signal from Simba.  He has left Great Salt Lake and is now over 600 miles southwest in Northern Mexico near the delta of the Colorado River.  Like Great Salt Lake, this location is also critical habitat for shorebirds.  The area is called the Estero Rio Colorado and is designated as a site of "International Importance" through the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network.  Check out Simba's map for his most recent location.

We have received good signals from Torito, Florence, Clara and Sweco over the last several days.  All of these birds are still at Great Salt Lake.  Interestingly Torito, Clara and Sweco seem to be using the same area of Farmington Bay, near the southeastern corner.  We expect the remaining avocets here at Great Salt Lake to be leaving any day.

We will update maps again early next week.

Weekly Update

We are waiting for the Avocets to begin migrating any time now. As of today, Florence is near the causeway to Antelope Island; Clara remains in Farmington Bay and Foxey is at the South end of the lake. No recent data has been received from Torito, Sweco, Nala, Simba, or Leah.

Weekly Update

Foxey has been on the move lately; she has moved from Farmington Bay to Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge then to the South and Southwest side of the lake. Many PTTs have only given us intermittent data during the last week or two. The last data from Sweco was from 08/29 and Florence 08/28. No recent data has been collected from Leah, Simba and Nala. Some good news is that Torito and Clara continue to give us continuous data.

Poor quality data

Today I was rather disappointed to see only a few good signals coming from our birds.  We only have signals from Torrito, Florence, Clara and Foxey.  I'm not sure what has happened to the other 4.  We've had several days of overcast skies here in northern Utah which could be interfering with the ability of the solar panels to fully charge up the batteries.  Hopefully we'll get data soon.

Torrito is currently at the south end of Farmington Bay near the Turpin unit of the Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area.  Florence is back near the Gillmor sanctuary south of Brown's Island.  Foxey has moved from Farmington Bay across the Antelope Island Causeway to Ogden Bay near Pintail Flats.  I believe Clara is still in Farmington Bay but her signal quality is too low to get a good location.

 

Weekly Update

This week Simba remains near Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and Florence is found today near Gillmor AUDUBON Sanctuary. We have not received any data from Nala since the 3rd of August and still no data coming in from Leah since the 9th of July. All other birds are found within Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area.