Updates from our Cuckoos

After keeping us anxiously guessing for several days, KP has finally moved on from the remote Tibesti Mountains and flown the remaining 1,000 km (621 miles) south to complete his desert crossing.

He must've found sufficient food around the few oases and rivers of the mountains to sustain him for a few days before pressing on south. He is now in south-western Chad, approximately 66 km (41 miles) south-east of the capital N'Djamena where he will hopefully be able to replenish his fat reserves and recover from his journey.

Last year KP reached the Sahel further east in Sudan on 24 August and remained in the Sahelian region of Sudan/Chad until mid October when he crossed into Central African Republic and shortly after moved south to the Congo. 

Henry has departed Croatia and crossed the Mediterranean to Libya.

During Monday evening and the early hours of Tuesday morning he travelled south through the Libyan Sahara and by 8 am on Tuesday he was 140 km (87 miles) south west of Wam an Namus, a volcano in south-central Libya.

We received a cluster of locations spread over a few hours which could suggest that Henry has stopped in the desert. This would not be a good sign as the location he is in appears to have little in the way of water or shelter.

Hopefully when we next hear from him he will have progressed south into Niger or Chad. Fingers crossed for Henry!  

After retreating from Portugal to Spain, Cuthbert has flown 300 miles south and is now in southern Portugal.

He is just west of the village of Lousal in the Alentejo Province of Portugal. It looks most likely that Cuthbert will cross from Portugal to Morocco and proceed south across the Sahara along the western edge via Western Sahara and Mauritania.

Henry has been busy over the last 48 hours, pressing on from his last location in the Czech Republic.

He has passed over Austria, Slovenia and Bosnia & Herzegovina on a journey covering 830 km (515 miles) that has taken him to his new location in Croatia. He has reached the Pelješac peninsula in the far south of Croatia, and is approximately 50 km (30 miles) north-west of Dubrovnik.

Worcestershire Cuckoo Severn is in Kosovo, 175 miles due east of Henry, while Irish Cuckoo Torc is 195 miles south-east in Albania.

After following him over a complete migration cycle from his breeding grounds in Worcestershire to his non-breeding grounds in Angola, the time has come to say a sad goodbye to Cuckoo Trent.

Trent arrived back at his breeding site on 29 April and remained in that area, but something happened to him around 28th June, not long before he was due to depart again. Since then his tag has been transmitting from the same location with no movements reported. He should of course be well on his way south again by now, and so we have to conclude that he has perished. 

Severn reached Sicily on Sunday 18th, after several weeks in northern Italy.

He was at the north-eastern coast of Sicily at 6pm, carried on down the eastern side of the island and by 10pm was heading out to sea again.

He continued in a south-easterly direction over the Med from Sicily, heading towards the north coast of Libya. However, after about eight hours of flying and having covered some 400 km (249 miles) over the open sea, he suddenly started to deviate east. 

At 18:50pm on Monday 19th he was still over the Mediterranean between Libya and Greece.

However, by 4am on Wednesday 21st he was 880km (547 miles) to the north, in northern Macedonia, close to the border with Kosovo. Subsequent updates show that he has moved north into Kosovo where he is currently close to the city of Mitrovica in northern Kosovo.

After his unexpected move to northern Germany, where he has spent the last few weeks, Henry is finally on the move again.

He has flown 540 km (336 miles) south-east to the Czech Republic. It'll be interesting to see whether he stops here or carries on south.

Severn’s lengthy Italian break came to an end a few days ago, after he set off from just north of Bologna, bypassing Rome and cutting across to Sicily.

Having worked his way along Sicily’s east coast, he set off across the Mediterranean last night (18) and just after 10am this morning, we received a signal showing that he was approaching the north-east Libyan coast.

Having covered around 1,200 km (745 miles) of relentless Sahara Desert since crossing the Mediterranean, KP appears to be taking a break in the Tibesti Mountains in northern Chad.

With canyons and vegetated valleys running throughout this range, he will hopefully be finding plenty of food to fuel the next leg of his journey south.  

After fuelling up and resting for a while in Senegal, Wilfrid moved eastwards, passing through Mali and into Burkina Faso.

In the past few days he has continued on into southern Niger, and our latest signal shows him currently on the border with north-west Nigeria. He is just to the north of the Gagere River, approximately 100 km (62 miles) from the city of Maradi.