Updates from our Cuckoos

We were waiting for further signals to confirm whether Nelson had left Norfolk and transmissions received from Nelson’s tag on 9 July show that he had moved to the south of France and was near Villefranche-de-Rouergue, about 90km (55 miles) north of Toulouse.  From here he covered another 380 km (240 miles) in a south-easterly direction and locations by early this morning (12 July) placed him a couple of miles inland at La Mole, near to the coast east  of Toulon. 

By the morning of the 10 July it appears that Skinner had left the Netherlands and ventured south to central France, where he was 55km (35 miles) north of Lyon.  Poor signals this morning indicate he has continued to Spain and is in the Catalonia region,  675km (420 miles) from his location in France. If this is confirmed by further transmissions, he will be the second of our Cuckoos tagged in 2013 to venture in to Spain. 

In the early morning on the 8 July, 128303 was close to Inveraray, having travelled around 125km (75 miles) south.  Another 200km (125 miles) in 24 hours and he was close to Gretna, flying over the border and in to England just after this. Signals received in the last few days show that he remains in the area between Carlisle and Brampton. Both Roy and Wallace did a similar thing last year, settling close to the border of England and Scotland before moving on, Roy towards the North Moors National Park and then Germany and Wallace back to Scotland and then to France. 

Signals on 5 July revealed that Livingstone had travelled to Italy, joining Chris and BB. Further signals received on 10 July show he is still in the same area, close to the river Po on the border of the Provinces of Pavia and Alessandria.   The area which both Whortle and David have travelled to, and then backtracked from, is about 70km (45 miles) south of Livingstone’s current position. 

...but he has not gone far, skipping over to nearby lincolnshire transmissions on the 6 July transmissions reveal. He is in the area close to Holbeach St Mark, just north of Holbeach and slightly inland from the coast. He has moved around 105km (65 miles) west from his previous location on the coast nearby Sea Palling in Norfolk. 

Poor quality signals on 7 July indicate that Nelson has left Norfolk and crossed the Channel to France to the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region. We will have to wait for the next good transmissions to confirm his current location and for this to show on the map.  

On the evening of 6 July Waller’s tag transmissions revealed he was in Belgium! Poor quality signals received late on 4 July, just south of Port Augustus, may indicate the very start of this journey. Two days later he had flown roughly 1060km (660 miles) from his location on the Isle of Skye and was on the northern edge of the Ardennes mountain region, Belgium. Signals just a few hours later show he continued onwards, changing direction and heading in a south-westerly direction towards France over the Ardennes mountains. On the morning of 7 July and roughly 160km (100 miles) further south-west, he was close to Revigny-sur-Ornain, a commune in Lorraine in north-eastern France. 

From his position near Vitoria, in the north-west of Spain on 2 July, Nick has headed further south. By early morning on 7 July he was around 160km (100 miles) west of Madrid. He is still currently the only Cuckoo in Spain and is currently the most southerly tagged Cuckoo. It remains to be seen whether any of the others will also follow that way. Dart and Ryder are in southern France so it will be interesting to see whether they head to France or Italy on their next movement. 

Whortle looks like he ventured in to the Po Valley in Italy in the early hours of 4 July, travelling 85km (53 miles) in a north-easterly direction from his location in the corner of France. A series of transmissions show him moving around the area near Piampaludo over several hours but two days later he was retracing his steps and returned back to his last location in France. Perhaps he was unable to find a good source of food and so retreated back to the last good feeding site? 

Chris has covered another 75km (45 miles) heading south from the Venetian Lagoon to the Po Valley. His last transmissions revealed he was at a location close to the River Po, near Ariano nel Polesine in the Province of Rovigoa. This area has proved popular with other tagged Cuckoos, with three birds spending almost a month in the watershed of the River Po in the first year, and six stopping here last year.  Several British-ringed birds had previously been reported here before the project started and tracking them has confirmed this is a very important stop-over site for British Cuckoos.  In the first year of the project, Chris spent a month of feeding up in this area before quickly moving south, having put on enough fat to enable him to undertake not only the crossing of the Mediterranean Sea but also the crossing of the Sahara desert at its widest point.