 |
|
 |
|
| Adoption Program |
|---|
 Caniapiscau Bald Eagle |
 Kerrypace Flatback Turtle |
 Jill II Loggerhead |
 Paddles Flatback Turtle |
Machi - Whimbrel Tracking in the Americas
A project of The Center for Conservation Biology.
Static Map | Zoom Map | Animated Map
Migration Map for Machi the Whimbrel.
Background
Migration Overview for Machi:
Fall 2011 Update: We have unfortunately discovered that Machi, after flying through Tropical Storm Maria, has been shot by hunters in Guadeloupe. She had made the non-stop flight from Virginia to Paramaribo, Suriname the previous two falls without encountering any storms.
Fall 2011: After breeding season, Machi flew to Southampton Island, the same staging area as in Fall 2010 migration. She then flew to the Eastern Shore, where she currently is staging before her annual flight to South America. She recently went through Hurricane Irene while on the Eastern Shore, surviving by riding on floating wrack throughout the storm!
Spring/Summer 2011: After completing a 3,400 mile flight from Belem, Brazil to Bull Island, SC, Machi decided to fly up the coast to the exact location where she was caught. She was photographed and seen well by one of the researchers that helped to catch her in Virginia! Machi then flew to breeding grounds in Canada, roughly 400 miles Northwest of Churchill, Manitoba.
Winter 2010-2011: After a staggering 113 hour flight that covered 4302 km, Machi landed on the shores of Suriname in South America, very near the capital city of Paramaribo on 7 September 2010. She staged there for approximately 12 days before continuing on to her wintering location, very near Sao Luis, Brazil and is likely to remain in that area until the spring migration. This location is the same wintering site that Machi occupied during the winter of 2009-2010. Machi has now traveled a total of 25,646 km during her journeys. Stay tuned for updates in the Spring of 2011 and follow her migration on this website and at http://ccb-wm.org/programs/migration/Whimbrel/whimbrel.htm! Subscribers to this website will get daily email updates of the locations of our satellite tagged whimbrels.
Migration Fall 2010: Machi staged on Southampton Island, Nunavut Canada for 11 days after the breeding season, from 20 July til 31 July 2010. Two other satellite tagged birds (Hope and Chinquapin) staged on that island or on a nearby island as well during this time period. This area is likely an important staging area for a significant proportion of the population of whimbrels. Machi flew non-stop for 161 hours and 3096 km to Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildife Refuge and Sedge Islands State Wildlife Management Area in New Jersey, staging there for 5 days (7 August to 12 August) before making the jump to The Nature Conservancy's Virginia Coastal Reserves Eastern Shore of Virginia (her original place of capture). She staged there for 19 days (13 August to 3 September), fattening up on fiddler crabs before continuing on to her wintering grounds.
Spring Migration and Breeding Season 2010: Machi began the spring migration with a bang, flying 5,153 km in 114 hours on 14 April 2010 before encountering an offshore front and redirecting her flight towards Florida. She landed near Pahokee, Florida on 19 April 2010 on the south edge of Lake Okeechobee, staging in the cane field dikes for 10 days (where she was photographed by local bird enthusiasts) until continuing on to the Eastern Shore of Virginia where she staged for 25 days from 30 April til 24 May 2010. She then flew to the mouth of the Hayes River, a flight of 2563 km in 37 hours, in the Hudson Bay Lowlands of Manitoba, Canada, staging there for 3 days and then continuing on to breeding locations north and west of there. She was on breeding locations for 43 days, long enough to have potentially hatched young that will continue this magnificent cycle.
Fall Migration and Winter 2009-2010: Machi was captured on 20 August 2009 and banded with green alpha-numeric leg flag “AXP”. This whimbrel left the Virginia barrier island saltmarshes on 10 September 2009 and headed southeast over the Atlantic Ocean. She bypassed the Antilles Islands of the Caribbean and didn’t make landfall until Suriname on 14 September 2009, a non-stop 116 hour and 4,230 km flight. She staged near Paramaribu, Suriname for 11 days before continuing south along the northeast coast of South America and wintering in Brazil near Sao Luis, a 5,821 km trip from Virginia.
- The presentation of data here does not constitute publication. All data remain copyright of the project partners. Maps or data on this website may not be used or referenced without the explicit written consent of the data owners.
- For more information please visit the project website.
- This map connects positions generated by the ARGOS system designated as location class (lc) '3', '2', '1', '0'. Locations that have been "filtered" are displayed as small red dots.
- This maps also shows locations of class 'A' as small black dots which are not connected by a route line.
- Bathymetry layers are derived from the GEBCO One Minute Grid.
- Sea surface temperature and chlorophyll are derived from NASA's Ocean Color data.
- Ocean currents and sea surface heights are derived from AVISO's Ssalto/Duacs Gridded Absolute Dynamic Topography & absolute geostrophic velocities data.