Updates from our Cuckoos

In the early hours of Saturday morning, we received a location from Victor's tag that told us he had successfully made it back to his breeding site in King's Forest, Suffolk. Since his arrival he doesn't look to have been doing much resting, he has been ranging quite widely in the forest and the surrounding area. Presumably he is keen to find a female or two.

On 11 April, Victor was embarking on his desert crossing, and midway through Algeria and the tough crossing. By 13 April he had not only completed this, but an ocean crossing aswell, to reach the island of Sardinia, 1985km (1230 miles) from his previous location in Algeria. From Sardinia, he continued on another 610km (380 miles) to France, where a location placed him 60km (40 miles) southwest of Lyon.  He is the third of our Cuckoos to return to Europe. 

The latest signals, received yesterday, show that Victor is also on his way home and was mid-way through his desert crossing. The location yesterday afternoon placed him in Algeria, 1950km (1210 miles) from his last location in Ivory Coast. A further poor quality signal indicates he continued on a further 235km (145 miles) so we will have to wait for further signals to see where he is and whether he has completed his desert crossing. He is the third of our tagged Cuckoos to cross the desert this year and is ahead of last year's schedule, where he had completed his desert crossing by 23 April and was back in the UK by 6 May.   

During the evening of 2 April we received a couple of locatrions that showed Victor has begun to move west and has crossed the border in to Ivory Coast. It will be interesting to see where he is when we next hear from him. Will he haved moved further west or begun his desert crossing?

Victor has made a big movement westwards and is now in Ghana, West Africa. By 8 March he had covered 1790km (1100 miles) from his previous location in Central African Republic, from where his tag last transmitted on 3 March, and was west of Lake Volta. He's a little bit ahead of where he was at this time last year, when he moved to Ghana in early April and had crossed the desert to northern Africa by 23 April. Will he spend longer preparing for his crossing or take on the challenge earlier than in 2017?

Victor's newest signals on 14 February show he's moved a further 400km (245 miles) northwards and is now in the west of the Central African Republic. 

Since 27 November Victor has journeyed 265km (170 miles) south within Gabon by the early hours of the 29 November.  He is now just south-east of Bongoville. 

From northern Gabon, Victor has moved to eastern Gabon, travelling 270km (170 miles). He is now close to Mbay and the Mwagne National Park. Last year at this time he was in Cameroon where he remained until 26 October. He then went on to Angola, where we saw him spend last winter. 

By the late afternoon of 26 August Victor had traveled 360km (225 miles) to southern Nigeria. He continued moving eastwards through until the early evening when his tag transmitted from the Lower Niger Forest, close to the River Niger. The next transmission two days later was from the Cameroon/Gabon border, from within the Congo Rainforest Basin, some 740km (460 miles) to the south east. Victor had made it to the rainforest!