Tag Archives: Solly and her tracker

Great News for Karl II and family

There was quite a bit of worry a couple of days ago when there had beern no transmissions received from Karl II, Udu, or Pikne.

Karl II, 2021
Karl II and his mate, Kaia, 2021
Karl II with his and Kaia’s three chicks in the nest in the Karula National Forest, Estonia, 2021. Of the three, Udu and Pikne survived. Tuul sadly passed.

Sometimes we just have to trust and hope that the birds are alright. One of the best ways to keep the GPS trackers very light weight is to power them by the sun. Even in the Mediterranean, the sun does not always shine and the batteries can run very low and need a charge OR the birds can be outside of an areas with signals OR both. Today, we are going to celebrate! Just look at the tracking below for Karl II, Udu, and Pikne, the Black Storks from the Karula Forest in Estonia. Tears.

Ladies first today. Pikne is in the Eastern Desert of either Ethiopia or Eritrea and is currently out of signalling range. She has moved and is making great time!

The Eastern Desert is simply the area of the Sahara Desert on the east side of the Nile River. It is sometimes called the Red Sea Hills. There are mountains as well as the coastal waters along the Nile. The area is known for its beautiful clear waters and excellent scuba diving.

“Looking up the reef (vertical) at Halahi Reef, Red Sea, Egypt #SCUBA #UNDERWATER #PICTURES” by Derek Keats is licensed under CC BY 2.0
“Nile Class Sailing boat & Tridentte 16 on the Red Sea Egypt” by Sierragoddess is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

Udu successfully crossed the Mediterranean and is now in the Western Desert of Egypt. So, Udu is west of the Nile River. That is incredible news. It is extremely challenging for the birds to cross the Mediterranean Sea and this fledgling did it on his first trip. What a strong bird Udu is!

“P5010091c Gilf Kebir. View at the top. Western Desert, Egypt. 1st May 2006” by Paul Ealing 2011 is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Dad may have stayed around the Baltic Sea for awhile but he has really moved and look – he is at the Merave Reservoir in Sudan along the Nile River. He is alive!

“Nile River at Sunset, Sudan” by valerian.guillot is licensed under CC BY 2.0

The whole family is safe. What an incredible relief for everyone.

People in New Zealand and all the followers of Tiaki, the Royal Albatross Cam Princess for 2021, can also celebrate. She has reached the waters off the coast of Chile.

Another tracker that has been on the ‘fritz’ is Solly, the 2020 female fledgling from the Port Lincoln Osprey Barge. People were also getting worried, just like they did for Karl II and his two children. But all is well with Solly, too. She is still staying at her favourite tree at Eba Anchorage.

In a week or so, one or all of the three Bobs at the Port Lincoln Osprey barge will be fitted with a tracker like Solly. It is going to be so interesting to follow their travels and to see where those wings take them to fish and live.

Here is a great article on the use and benefits of satellite telemetry to study birds and their migration. It was written in 2012 but everything still applies today.

https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/satellite-telemetry-and-its-impact-on-the-94842487/

It is raining on the Canadian Prairies just like it has been in Melbourne and Port Lincoln. Even so, the birds were fed and all are well. The falcons at Melbourne learned about thunder and lightning! It is hard to imagine but we will be on fledge watch in two weeks for those four running up and down the gutter – and the week after that we will be expecting Yurruga to fledge. My, my. Time passes so quickly.

Thank you for joining me today. For those of you who did get to see Season of the Osprey, drop me a line and tell me what you think. Take care all. Stay warm and dry and safe.

Thank you to the Port Lincoln Osprey FB page for the figure showing where Solly is, for the NZ DOC and Wildlife Computers for the tracking of Tiaki, and to the Eagle Club of Estonia for its Forum page and its streaming cam where I took screen grabs of the family and the map showing where Karl and his family are currently located.

The Birds ‘Down Under’

As people in North America wait for the Bald Eagles to begin preparing their nest and breeding, much of the ‘bird’ action is in Australia. I pulled up a map so that we can locate the nests that are on streaming cams in Australia – fondly known as ‘Down Under’ here in Canada.

I made the map a little larger just so it is easier to see. Or is it just me that is having trouble reading all that small print?!

The White-Bellied Sea Eagle Nest is in Sydney. On the map it is in bold letters on the lower right hand side. The Peregrine Falcon Nest of Xavier and Diamond is in Orange. Orange is just outside of Sydney. Trace your finger to 10 o’clock from Sydney and you should see Orange in grey letters. The 367 Collins Street Falcons are in Melbourne. It is at the very bottom in black letters. The Port Lincoln Osprey Barge is in Port Lincoln. This is a small place. Locate Adelaide which is up the coast from Melbourne on the left. Take your finger and move it over in a straight line to the left from Adelaide to the bottom of the second peninsula. There is Port Lincoln. I am also going to include Solly’s Location so you can see where she is relative to where she hatched and fledged at Port Lincoln. Solly is currently staying the majority of the time at Eba Anchorage. Solly is 311 km from the place she fledged. Prior to Solly, the general understanding was that Eastern Ospreys stayed much closer to their natal nest. The evidence from the satellite tracking is changing the understanding of how far these fledglings might travel upon fledging.

Time flies. It was only a blink and Pippa Atawhai, the 2020 Royal Cam chick, had fledged — BUT, that was a year ago. Now we are waiting for Tiaki to fledge soon. It seemed like the month of August just melted. It was on the 3rd, the 6th, and the 9th that Mum at the Port Lincoln Osprey Barge laid her eggs for the 2021 season. At this very moment, the PLO FB Page is taking guesses on when the eggs will hatch. Yes, we will be moving into hatch watch within a week. Baby Ospreys are coming. Oh, those lovely little reptiles!

Dad continues to bring in materials for the nest. They are all over the place – big strips of bark and moss – even some more rope. He is a bit of a pack rat. Thank goodness he hasn’t been bringing in toys like Richmond and Jack in the US. It would be awfully crowded if that were to happen.

Watching this nest is not for the faint of heart. Siblicide is a regular occurrence.

The dominant hatch of 2021 was Solly. She is 352 days old on 7 August, Australian time. Solly was considered, out of the two surviving chicks, to be the one that would succeed. We have no news of DEW and unlike Solly, DEW was not equipped with a satellite transmitter. Solly has, however, demonstrated that she can survive and today she flew rom her normal home tree in Eba Anchorage to Perlubie to check out the fish. This is the graph from the satellite transmission.

The Port Lincoln Osprey Project is taking guesses as to the date of the first hatch on their FB page. You don’t need to be a member to pick a day – go and have some fun!

The White Bellied Sea Eaglets are doing fine. They are well fed and protected and they are growing so fast. Those beautiful juvenile feathers are coming in changing their appearance almost daily. They had a good fish feast the morning of the 6th and the wee ones slept and then woke up and began picking up sticks and leaves on the nest moving them about with their beak. They are not yet steady on their feet but they are standing more and 27 was attempting to walk today.

Both still had big crops after the fish breakfast. 28 got the majority.

Just look at those beautiful colours coming in. 27 is on the left and 28 is on the right.

Here 27 is standing watching 28 play with some sticks with its beak and talons. The sea eaglets are developing at a normal pace. It is all good.

The golden glow of morning fills the scrape box of the Peregrine Falcons, Xavier and Diamond, in Orange.

Each parent takes turns incubating the eggs so that the other can have a break. Diamond will do the overnight incubation and Xavier will be the security guard.

Here is a short video of the hand over of incubating duties from Diamond to Xavier:

Remember that the males are about 30% smaller than the females. Xavier works with his feet and wings to get those three large eggs under him so they can all be warm.

It is even harder for the tiny male at the 367 Collins Street nest who has four eggs to warm!

Mom arrives for her turn.

She is working her wings too to get those four eggs under her.

Looked at how poofed out all those feathers are. Wow.

Here is Dad. His feathers are all poofed, too. He is so tiny compared to mom. My goodness – he really does have to work to get all four under him properly.

After wiggling about he gets everything settled. We will be looking for hatch towards the end of September.

Thank you so much for joining me. All of the birds in Australia seem to be doing just fine. We will watch the sea eagles change colour before our eyes and anticipate the arrival of the Ospreys. It’s a few weeks before falcons start hatching. Take care everyone.

Thank you to the following for their streaming cams where I took my screen shots and video clips: The 367 Collins Street Falcons, The Falcon Cam at Charles Sturt University and Cilla Kinross, Sea Eagle Cam @ Birdlife Australia Discovery Centre, and the Port Lincoln Osprey Project and FB Page.

PLEASE NOTE: I am taking my computer in for servicing. I hope to have it returned to me sometimes on Thursday so I will be back with another newsletter Thursday or Friday.

Tracking…birds and hurricanes

Hurricane Ida has made landfall on the sixteenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina that wrecked havoc and caused so much destruction to Louisiana. Throughout the day I have been checking on the Kisatchie National Forest, the home of Bald Eagles, Anna and Louis. The Bald Eagles are likely north of the storm area as they do not spend the hot summer, as far as is known, at Lake Kincaid (although they could).

The winds were getting stronger and the waves more choppy as the morning broke into the afternoon. That camera quit working at 15:39:19. You just get a circle. The KNF is in parishes that are northwest of New Orleans. They include Grant, Natchitoches, Winn, Rapides, and Vernon.

Isn’t that just the most beautiful area to raise a Bald Eagle family?

Cody and Steve did a great job running the camera, answering all of the chatters questions, and even held a contest to name the eaglet. Please send them warm wishes to stay safe.

At 18:00, Hurricane Ida just went through Mathews, Louisiana.

There are several other maps that I am also watching today. One of those is just fantastic. If you want to follow the Black Storks on their migration, you need to know this link.

http://birdmap.5dvision.ee/EN

The ‘Birdmap’ has several Ospreys along with the Black Storks who have satellite trackers. They are first sorted into species and then by name of the bird. Click on the name of the bird and you can see where the birds are located. It is magnificent.

I clicked on Karl II’s name. Then I clicked on the player at the bottom and I could see the precise route that Karl II has taken since he left the nest in the Karula National Forest. He is heading to the Black Sea. I wonder if Karl has a favourite spot there?

I owe Karl a big apology, too. I know that Pikne and Udu are ‘his’ storklings and brain keeps telling my fingers to type Grafs. Big apology, Karl!

Oh, how I wish Tiny Little had a tracker. It would be so much fun (well, if everything went well) to watch her journey rather than hoping by mere chance that someone would see her blue Darvic Ring and record the number. Perhaps it would be too much to ask them to take a photo, too?

There is not a lot of news in Bird World. Maya was photographed at Rutland Water today so she has not left for her migration. The Collins Street Falcons have started the hard incubation now that the 4th egg has been laid.

This is mom. She always has a bit of grumpy face and she takes up most of the scrape box.

This is cute little dad. He is much smaller as you can see – he doesn’t take up so much room in that scrape box. If in doubt, he has really neat bright yellow “goggles” around his eyes.

I know that it is hard to see what is going on and you are afraid that you will miss all of the action. There is another scrape box at the other end of the ledge with a camera and these parents have a tendency to move the chicks about. There is nothing funnier than seeing 3 large juvenile females chase after poor little dad with his pigeon. This year it will be 4! I hope the pigeon population in Melbourne is robust!

Diamond is keeping everyone guessing. The latest that she has ever laid an egg is the 31st of August and that is tomorrow, Australia time! At this point I am not even going to guess. Diamond has been fooling me for days on end.

When in Australia, I have to remind myself to check on Solly. She is 344 days old – my goodness, almost a year since she hatched on the PLO barge. Look at this map of her travels. She is so confident now that she is taking the short cut back to Eba Anchorage from the coast near Streaky Bay instead of going the land route. Well done, Solly! So proud of you.

The nest of Mom and Dad looks so much more together than it did after Solly and DEW fledged last year! Oh, I hope that there is lots of food and all three of those eggs hatch and fledge. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I have to admit that I did not feel so kind towards Solly last year but, in the end, I was glad to see two strong birds fly off that old boat. The satellite tracker put on Solly opened up everyone’s eyes to how far the Eastern Ospreys travel from their natal nest. I do hope they will do this again this year. At the same time, I would like to see trackers on all the birds from this nest. Everyone wants to also know where DEW is. If it is the cost, do some crowd funding up front – there will be people from around the world willing to chip in and help with the costs.

‘S’ sent me some images of the Osprey juveniles in Alberta this morning. My goodness did I ever feel guilty. I checked in on them for the first time yesterday in ever so long – and that was because I had heard of an unmonitored nest fledging two from the interior of British Columbia this morning.

There were three eggs that hatched at the Red Deer Osprey nest in June. Two of the three died on 3 July during the wretched heat and then rainy/stormy weather.

This beautiful juvenile fledged sometime the first two weeks of August when the cameras were down. This is a strong bird, a real survivor. It has been given the name, Little Braveheart, by her fans.

The two juveniles at the Fortis Exshaw nest up at Canmore are doing really well, too. Both fledged and they are waiting, just like the juvenile in Red Deer, for the call to fly south. That is such an incredibly beautiful spot to have an Osprey platform with the Canadian Rockies in the background.

Thank you so much for joining me. Do check the Birdmap and see how it works. Satellite trackers are wonderful tools. And please send your warm wishes and positive thoughts to those in the path of Hurricane Ida. Take care and stay safe. See you soon.

Thank you to the following for their streaming cams where I took my screen shots: Fortis Alberta Red Deer, Fortis Alberta Exshaw, 367 Collins Street by Mirvac, The Falcon Cam Project at Charles Sturt University in Orange and Cilla Kinross, the KNF Bald Eagle Cam, and the Port Lincoln Osprey Project.