Lower Derwent Valley Whimbrel project (Yorkshire, UK) (1 Viewer)

[Ingsbirder]

Some interesting summaries of the ongoing Lower Derwent Valley Whimbrel project (which started in 2004) can be found at:

http://ldvnnr.blogspot.co.uk/

Over the years 100 birds at the Wheldrake Ings roost have been fitted with colour-rings, whilst several have been radio-tracked and four have been fitted with satellite trackers.

This year the first birds were seen back in the LDV on the 13th and numbers should start building up at Wheldrake Ings shortly. The Whimbrel roost is best viewed from Swantail Hide at Wheldrake Ings.

 

[Steve Lister]

Any colour-ring sightings away from the LDV yet ?
Or what does the tagging tell you about destinations and wintering sites/

Steve

 

[LDVbirder]

Three whimbrel back at the LDV tonight - found in the feeding fields off the reserve before flying off to the roost site at Wheldrake Ings. All three (amazingly) were colour-ringed during previous years here, one having been originally ringed in 2006 and two in 2009.

The sat tagging work has tracked birds to both the Icelandic breeding grounds, but also to breeding areas on the Swedish/Finnish border, and then back to the wintering grounds around Guinea in Africa, a round trip of c16,000km. That means that the bird ringed in 2006 has probably clocked up in the order of 96,000km since we originally caught him!! :clap:

They seem very site faithful returning to the spring staging site here at LDV year after year, putting on a huge amout of weight in a relatively short time, presumably for the non-stop flight to the breeding grounds mentioned above -which takes about 24 hours.

Anyway, for more info keep an eye on http://ldvnnr.blogspot.co.uk/ where we will be posting regular updates on whats happening.

 

[Tom Lawson]

Dave Tate is doing a talk on the Whimbrel project in the LDV to the York Ornithological Club on Tuesday 1st May in the Friends Meeting House,Friargate,York,starting at 7.30pm. All are welcome.

Three whimbrel back at the LDV tonight - found in the feeding fields off the reserve before flying off to the roost site at Wheldrake Ings. All three (amazingly) were colour-ringed during previous years here, one having been originally ringed in 2006 and two in 2009.

The sat tagging work has tracked birds to both the Icelandic breeding grounds, but also to breeding areas on the Swedish/Finnish border, and then back to the wintering grounds around Guinea in Africa, a round trip of c16,000km. That means that the bird ringed in 2006 has probably clocked up in the order of 96,000km since we originally caught him!! :clap:

They seem very site faithful returning to the spring staging site here at LDV year after year, putting on a huge amout of weight in a relatively short time, presumably for the non-stop flight to the breeding grounds mentioned above -which takes about 24 hours.

Anyway, for more info keep an eye on http://ldvnnr.blogspot.co.uk/ where we will be posting regular updates on whats happening.