Important Bird Areas

Nicaragua Bird Tagging Project Produces First Data Set!

Wood Thrush at El Jaguar with geolocator attached

The first four geolocator data maps have been produced for birds tagged at El Jaguar (our partners in Nicaragua).  During last year's Audubon member trip to Nicargua, participants met George and Lili Duriaux of El Jaguar and got to see Wood Thrush getting their backpack geolocators put on.  Four birds were re-captured in December and geolocators were sent to Bridgette Stutchberry, who along with Kevin Fraser, is analyzing the results.

As you can see in the maps below, the birds were active! Migrating from Central America clear up to our most north-eastern states and Canada. It's interesting to see the birds take a direct flight path south to warm winter roosts in the fall, while the birds routes are more varied flying north in the spring. One bird even took the scenic route along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico before finally heading north. This data is incredibly useful to expand our knowledge of bird migratory patterns and behaviors.

Read more about the 2012 trip in previous blog posts:

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