Updates from our Cuckoos

None of the Cuckoos began crossing the Sahara, as anticipated, over the Easter weekend but we still expect them to make a move soon. Stay tuned for further updates when we get news of any movements. 

From his position in Central Cameroon on 27 March, Lloyd continued onwards and by the late evening of 29 March he was in the Southwest region of Cameroon. Several hours later, and just minutes after the clocks ticked in to 30 March, he crossed the border and entered Nigeria. He had travelled 330km (205 miles). The next transmission was received early yesterday morning ( 1 April) and showed he had travelled a further  395km (245 miles) across Nigeria and was in the Ondo Region.  The closest Cuckoo to Lloyd’s new position is BB who is 300km (180 miles) to the east.

Chris has now been in the Digya National Park for 10 days preparing for his next move. Will he do this from Ghana or Ivory Coast, as last year? We do know that he didn't use the same stop-overs on his southward journey as he did the previous year so we will have to wait and see where he will attempt his crossing of the Sahara Desert from this time.

David is still in the Central Region of Cameroon. He is currently 57km (35 miles) north-west of Cameroon's capital, Yaounde, the second largest city in the country with a population of approximately 2.5 million. 

Signals were received from BB’s tag yesterday morning and reveal that he has remained within Nigeria, in the Oyo district close to the border with Benin, where he has been for more than ten days now.

Lloyd remained at his location in the heart of the Congo Rainforest on Friday (22 March). However, a single unconfirmed location received in the early hours of this morning suggested that he had moved a further 450km (280 miles) NW since then, into north-western Democratic Republic of Congo and at the edge of the continuous rainforest. There were no further locations because the charge on his tag was very low, presumably due to him having spent time under the forest canopy, but we hope to have an update on his location on Wednesday morning. 

Having spent a month in eastern Ghana, by Sunday morning (24 March) Chance had moved 420km (416 miles) west to a location in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast). He is 40km (24 miles) north of the location that Martin spent 18 days preparing for his Sahara crossing at this time last year, and about 20km (12 miles) south of Comoé NP. As Chance has already spent some time at a stop-over in Ghana, we would expect him to spend less time in this area than Martin did. If timings are similar to last year, we would expect the first bird to head north over the desert during Easter weekend. 

Lloyd has moved on from the position in DRC that he has held for a month – but not by very much! New locations received early this morning show that he has moved 305km (189 miles) NNW since Sunday 17 March. He is in an area of closed-canopy forest in the heart of the Congo basin, about 245km (152 miles) almost due W of Kisangani, close to the border between Equator and Orientale regions. 

Chris has continued moving rapidly westwards and by Saturday morning (16 March) he was apparently settled in Digya National Park, Ghana. He had moved 1075km (667 miles) west in just over 2 days since the previous location in Nigeria. He is the second Cuckoo, following Chance, to make it to Ghana. Although his current location would be a great place for him to carry out his pre-Sahara crossing stop over, last year he did this in Cote d’Ivoire, so it will be interesting to see whether he stops here or carries on west.