Updates from our Cuckoos

Over the last few days Ellis has followed AJ from Nigeria towards the Congo rainforest. By 08:14 on Tuesday morning, Ellis had flown 1000Km (621 miles) south east and had reached the south-western corner of Central African Republic. He was close to Dzanga-Sangha National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site established as a protected site in 1990 and covering 6,865Km2. Will he remain here or follow AJ into Congo or DRC? Stay tuned to find out...

Since the last update, AJ has flown 633 Km (393 miles) south east into the south eastern corner of Cameroon. He is now in an area of lowland rainforest, close to Boumba Bek National Park.

Victor II has flown 155 Km (97 miles) south west within Niger, towards the border with Nigeria. He is now 150 Km north of PJ who is over the border in Nigeria.

Daniel left south eastern Mali on Friday and by Sunday evening he was in southern Niger. He didn't linger there long and by the early hours of this morning (1 September) he had flown on, clipping the north eastern corner of Nigeria and passing Lake Chad before arriving in Chad. He is now on the shores of Lake Fitri, approximately 260 Km (161 miles) east of the capital N'Djamena.   

New updates received late yesterday afternoon show that AJ has flown 450 km (280 miles) south east from his last location close to Abuja, Nigeria, over the border into Cameroon. He is close to Lake Bamendjing in the West region of Cameroon.

Clive is clearly a cool character, preferring to arrive fashionably late to the party. While the other Cuckoos were well into their journeys south, he held on in northern Spain until 25 August. Once he got moving, he didn't hang about. At 08:19 on 25 August he was in central Portugal and by 11:00 he had made it as fas as southern Portugal. He didn't stop there though and by 09:58 the next morning (26 August) he had crossed to Africa, making landfall close to the port city of Safi in Morocco. He continued down the west coast of Africa that day and by 22:10 that evening he was 118 km further south. We next heard from Clive during the evening of 28 August (Saturday) by which time he was in the Akchar desert, approximately 150 km south west of the Richart Structure (the eye of Africa). A couple of recent further updates show him in the same location. This isn't a very hospitable place for a Cuckoo so hopefully we will see a new update from further south soon. He is currently 221Km north of Harry's location. 

We have only received a few, low quality transmissions from Harry's tag over the last 10 days, all suggesting that he is still in central Mauritania. 

An update from Clive's tag got us excited last week as it suggested he may be crossing the Sahara. However, that lower quality signal has since been followed with several high quality updates from northern Spain, showing that Clive hasn't yet made his move to Africa and remains close to Torrelavega in Spain.

Norfolk Cuckoo Attenborough has been a particularly fascinating bird to follow his year as he made that extraordinary movement from Spain to Greece. Sadly though we think that route may have signaled the end for Attenborough, possible because he was unable to build up sufficient fat reserves to fuel his crossing of the Sahara. He made it as far as the Tibesti Mountains in northern Chad, where his journey ended. We don't know exactly what happened to him but those of you who have been following the project for a while may recall that this is the same area that we lost Cuckoo Chris. Attenborough's travels will of course contribute useful data to our growing understanding of Cuckoo migration.   

Since our last update, JAC has flown 357 Km (222 miles) south east into central Nigeria. He is now 200 Km north of the capital Abuja and just 55 Km south of Worcestershire Cuckoo Calypso.