Report on the travels and status of NW Australian satellite-tagged Bar-tailed Godwits

Please remember when reading the information below that this is not the ‘final story’, these are the initial findings and may change when the final analysis is done. We also ‘join the dots’ between each signal, however the birds are so skilled at navigating that this is most likely the route they travel.

Dear Godwit watchers

This is a brief update on the final southward leg for four of our wonderful Bar-tailed Godwits. 

Updates on each individual bird

C2 is taking a leisurely journey and has appeared to take a break in the Philippines.

C3 is BACK IN ROEBUCK BAY she first reported in from Bush point (the south west of the Bay) and then appeared to have moved north to the rich mudflats in the north east of the Bay so hopefully she will choose to roost on the northern shores and we will get to see her. However we have near 9m tides today and the coming few days so she will probably roost on salt pans behind the mangroves and our first realistic chance to see her will be this coming weekend.

C7 is well on her way back to Roebuck Bay; her last report came from half way between the Philippines and Sulawesi.

H3 who has led the way throughout the migration decided to take a break 880km north of the bay on Roti Island just, south and west of Timor, and she is still there.

Many thanks to all involved with the project and particularly to Lee Tibbitts for all her regular updates summaries and Google Earth grabs.

Now we cross our fingers for the batteries to last as well as the ones in the NZ birds did last year and see if we can track the southward migration right back to the northern shores of Roebuck Bay where the birds were first caught and implanted with the trackers. Don’t turn off yet folks!

For those of you not yet following the tracks of the NZ and Broome birds I recommend you do! It is fascinating stuff (but I would say that wouldn’t I?) To view the birds follow the information below.

The best way to follow the project is to visit the USGS site. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and there is a godwit icon: Click the godwit to download the kmz file/icon to your desktop. Click on the icon and this will open Google Earth, where you can view the globe with the travels of the godwits marked out on it. To view the birds follow the information below. When you click on the icon with a number you will be given a list of information. Note that the date is month/day/year and the time is UTC/Greenwich meantime, add 7 hours for WA and Chinese time. Korea is another one hour ahead.

• You will need Google Earth installed on your computer. It is a free download which you can get here »

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