119986, 119987, 119988, 120196 and 57109 during late March - early April 2013

Last summer we fitted 5 golden eagle chicks with satellite transmitters, one which unfortunately did not survive to fledging. We'll try to post maps of the movements of all these birds.

119986

119986: 24 March - 6 April 2013.

We have been following this bird in the blog for a few months now. You can look at the archived posts to view its history. The movements shown in the map above are similar to those made before.

119987

11987:24 March - 6 April 2013

Was a single chick fitted with a satellite transmitter at a site on Kintyre in June. The weather was awful with extreme humidity and clouds of midges, but a break in the rain gave us an opportunity to climb into the nest and fit the transmitter to the chick. We suspect that the chick is a male; it was in good condition. This bird made two exploratory trips prior to dispersing; since dispersing on the 1 March it has moved off into North Argyll. Much of the time period shown on the above map was spent by this bird in North Argyll with the location near Inverness being a likely transmitter error. For much of the period 1 - 3 April it was on the Cowal Peninsula, and ranged as far east as a location just northeast of Dumbarton.

119987 after tagging

119988

119988: 23 March - 2 April 2013



119988 was a single chick fitted with a satellite transmitter on the Island on Mull. This is the first golden eagle to be fitted with a transmitter on Mull. As the island is famed for its populations of raptors (especially golden and white-tailed eagles) it will be very interesting to follow its progress. This was another male bird and the nest contained had prey items including deer calves and both long and short-eared owls. This bird was the first of the tagged birds to fledge and was the most adventurous prior to deciding to permanently leave the natal site. After dispersing on the 15 Feb this bird has left Mull very briefly, moving as far as Fort William before returning to Mull where it has been exploring the island. Paul, keep your eyes peeled.



119988 after tagging

120196

120196 was a single chick fitted with a satellite transmitter near Loch Lomond. He was thinner and lighter than any of the other birds to which we fitted transmitters, but was in good fighting spirit. Signs of recent hard times (but previous good conditions) were that he had recently eaten his twin, which was presumably also experiencing hardship late on in the nestling period! Despite this poor start to life this male chick has managed to overcome this and ranged widely in the natal area prior to dispersal. After dispersing on the 9 March this bird has moved between Loch Fyne and Loch Katrine. The period covered by the map above has this bird moving between areas east of Loch Katrine and south of Loch Tay. There was a location at 10:00 on 3 April about 150 km east of Newcastle, but I guess that was an error.

120196 during tagging

57109

We have been making blog posts for this bird for some time now. Look at the archived blog posts to see its history. These areas visited in the map above have all been visited by this bird before... more or less.

 

57109: 02 - 18 March 2013

At the beginning of this time period 57109 wandered for 1-2 days around the south side of Loch Tay,  It then returned to concentrate its movement in the area it has spent most of the winter, making some forays to the north and southeast.

119986: 9 - 15 March 2013

Unfortunately, the transmitter fitted to 119986 is not transmitting as expected.  This could be due to feathers covering the solar panels, poor light conditions or a malfunction of the transmitter. It could also be due to a combination of factors.  In any case, during the narrow window of time shown on the map, 119986 confined its movements into an area about 7 km in diameter, SE of Pitlochry. 

57109: 01 - 13 February 2013

57109 started the period about 2 km north of the A9 and north of Calvine.  It spent the period wondering over areas where it has spent much of its time over the past months (see past posts).  By 13 February it was located only about 170 meters away from where it started the period.

119986: 6 - 14 February 2013

So, just as we no longer get transmissions from 32867 (See last post), another boldly ventures outside of its natal territory. 119986 is a female chick from a brood of two (above), tagged near Ballater in late June 2012. Both chicks were in excellent condition at around 4.5kg and 4.4kg. The slightly larger chick was tagged, although there wasn't really much difference between them. Since then 119986 has been roaming around within the natal territory but in January made the move to independence and has been exploring parts of Angus and Deeside.The map below shows its more recent movements, which are now some way away from its natal territory.  On 6 February this bird was located east of the Spittal of Glenshee, and by 14 February it had moved west and was located just north of Blair Atholl, not far from the location of 57109 (see post above)

57109: 17 January - 4 Feb 2013

57109 continued to move around the upland areas est of the A9 and west of Braemar.  On 30 January it was on the western slopes of Ben Macdui.

32867: 11 - 20 January 2013

32867 has a battery powered transmitter that uploads GPS data every 10 days.  The last upload was on 20 January, 17 days ago, and at that time data sent by the transmitter indicated the battery was drained.  So, it seems unlikely that we will get any more transmissions from this bird.  32867 was fitted with its tag when it was a nestling on 4 July 2010, and so has given us about 30 months of movement data.  For that whole period 32867 stayed almost entirely within about 20 km of its natal site, and these last days of transmissions were not different.  The last location on 20 January 2013 was on the coast east of Tarbert.