This June, the Cayuga Bird Club installed its second Motus station for detection of radio-tagged migratory birds. This new station is located on Cornell University property near the Hartung-Boothroyd Observatory on Mount Pleasant. With this receiver and our Motus receiver at Myers Point, we are supporting research that uses radio telemetry to study migration. When a radio-tagged bird flies by a Motus receiver, the location, date, and time of its detection is logged and shared with the international Motus network, which is operated by Birds Canada (motus.org). The more receivers there are along migration routes, the more details can be learned about flight trajectories and migration timing for a variety of species.
We have just learned of our first detection at Mount Pleasant. On August 11, a *Semipalmated Plover* was detected on its southward flight. This bird had been tagged on Hudson Bay in Manitoba in June. It was next detected on August 11 by Motus stations on the south shore of Lake Ontario and at Montezuma NWR before flying by Mount Pleasant. The most recent report for the plover was in North Carolina, August 13. A map of the bird’s trajectory can be seen at https://motus.org/data/track?tagDeploymentId=33465. We are looking forward to learning what other birds will fly by our Motus stations during Fall migration, and to seeing where they go. Two of the birds detected by our Myers Point Motus station last fall made it to Central America: a Tennessee Warbler to Costa Rica, and a Swainson’s Thrush to Panama! To learn more about Cayuga Bird Club’s Motus project, go to www.cayugabirdclub.org/motus <https://sites.google.com/site/cbc14850/motus>. Diane Morton Cayuga Bird Club -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
