Tracking pink footed geese

25.03 D-day

Coming Monday and Tuesday is a big day. A team of goose lovers is going to come back to western Julland (Stadil Fjord area) ,as they do every year at this time, and ring and mark some pink-footed and barnacle geese. We hope to catch around 150-200 birds which will be added to our database of about 4000 already marked pink-footed geese. Thanx to neckbands, we can track individual geese on their ways to and from breeding ground. We can get to know much more about timing of their migration, reproduction and survival rate, lifespan etc.

We also hope to deploy 5 additional satellite tags and add 5 new stories to our blog. Below are some pictures from the first trials of attachments of our new devices. So finger crossed for a good catch.

25.03 Time to come back

The spring has arrived. Geese and swans flocks are flying above our heads. I also spotted many birds species coming back from their wintering areas and this is definite sign that spring is here . Ingunn, Danuta and Lukasz give us regular GPS positions. The sun conditions are good enough for solar batteries to be fully charged and soon we should get even more positions per day. Unfortunately we haven't heard anything from Caroline. He is probably in DK with his tag still on his back. We have no idea what went wrong and we can only hope that someone can spot this goose with blue C6H neckband and tell us what happened. Christiane's tag is also not working very well. Last positions we received from 03.03 from western Julland between Nissum and Limfjorden.

And here are the stories of the others:
At the beginning of March, Lukasz was flying back and forth between Esbjerg and Ringkøbing Fjord but recently send us positions from Stadil Fjord area. These areas are still full of geese flocks.

Ingunn is mainly around Nissum fjord. Danuta flew all the way from northern to western Julland and joined other flocks around Stadil and Ringkøbing Fjord

In about 2-3 weeks we may expect first flocks to head north towards Trøndelag- the first stop before breeding areas in Svalbard. All geese have to now gain a lot of energy for a long flight and that is why we may observe huge flocks feeding in the fields.

14.02 Spring or Valentine's day?

The days are longer, the sun is brighter, and we get more and more data from our birds:) Danuta, Ingunn and Lukasz so all 'danish' geese are sending us positions. Caroline and Christiane are silent and I have no clue where they are now, whether they are still in NL and BL or flew back to DK. But I am patient:)

3.02 News from the Snow Queen land

Today we received data from three birds. Lukasz moved from Tipperne to Ribe area, Ingunn hangs around Nissum Fjord and Danuta is north from Limfjorden.

01.02 All good things come to an end

It is time to sum up autumn-winter migration. Number of uplinks is not so peachy and we have huge gaps when we don't know what happened to our birds. Reduced sun radiation and cloud cover did not allow solar batteries to fully recharge. We received mainly ARGOS locations which are not so accurate but better ought than nought.
Below are our geese 'go back home' routes. We more or less regularly receive data from Ingunn and Danuta and both geese are now in Denmark. Last news from Christiane we received 22.10!!! when he was still in The Netherlands. Lukasz send the last signal 6.12 from Tipperne in Denmark and Caroline on 30.12 from Belgium.

Ingunn

Caroline:

Christiane:

Danuta:

Lukasz:

31.01 Winter brake

During winter everything slows down, even data receiving. While waiting for new information from our geese, I decided to sum up what our guys have done so far. Let start from summer migration and breeding ground. All birds got to Svalbard as was expected: started from DK, moved to Trøndelag, all except Lukasz stopped in Vesterålen and all reached Svalbard 'on time'. Gitte lost the transmitter during his pre-breeding stay on Edgeøya. It is not easy to evaluate their breeding success. 5 out of six tagged geese (all except Lukasz again) were seen back on wintering areas so we know they are doing well and are in good condition. 4 were seen paired, one with gosling for sure and one maybe with gosling (it was already late in the season so it was hard to see the difference between adult and gosling). So here it is, flying North:

Ingunn:

Caroline:

Gitte:

Christiane:

Danuta:

Lukasz:

17.01 Setting forces

Although Danuta and Ingunn flew to Denmark just few days ago, they have visited more places in Julland than I for the last two years. After short stop around Fillsø, Ingunn moved to Nissum Fjord what is close to the place he was tagged. Danka flew to Limfjorden. So far so good, no more news.

11.01 Ingunn joined Danuta

He flew to Denmark today early morning and explores the area around Fillsø. These are the same fields as he visited on his way back from Svalbard (second picture: little red dots- positions from autumn, big red dot-position from today).

2.01 We have...

....'beautiful' spring this winter. Recently in Poland, there was +10C outside so I assume Netherlands do not suffer from heavy snowfalls either. As Jesper says, in mild winters, geese flocks tend to return to Denmark from wintering areas in Netherlands and Belgium. And so Danuta did. He is now back in Denmark on tidal area between Rømø and Mandø islands. Caroline and Ingunn still in Belgium.