Flinders, Victoria: Historic catch of Turnstones with Geolocators

Ken Gosbell, Victorian Wader Study Group, 9th January 2010:

Last March the VWSG used some relatively new technology by attaching geolocators to 8 Ruddy Turnstone; 6 of these were placed on birds captured at Flinders and 2 were placed on birds in SE of South Australia. These instruments, weighing 1.1g, record light levels and when the information is downloaded, they provide a record of the spatial movements of the bird with time. It was hoped that this would provide us with significantly more knowledge of the migration and breeding movements of these birds. However, to get this information, the bird needs to be recaptured and the instrument removed for downloading. Hence, we anxiously awaited the return of the birds to Flinders and SA. One bird with a geolocator was caught on 20 October 2009; unfortunately this malfunctioned when the bird was in the Sea of Okhosk in Eastern Russia but we did get some very useful information from it. This placed additional pressure on capturing the other instrumented birds.

Through the persistence of Penny Johns who monitored the birds at Flinders so closely, it was determined that we had another 3 geolocator birds back at Flinders in December. However, between October 2009 and now we have tried 4 times to catch these birds; on each occasion they have outwitted us. With good tides yesterday another attempt was made and YES, we achieved the ultimate goal of capturing all 3 geolocator birds!!  All birds were safely placed in keeping cages. Our first task was the removal of the precious geolocators which went without problem.

We will now send these geolocators off to Cambridge for downloading and I will keep you informed of the outcomes when they are received.

I would really like to acknowledge and thank the whole of the team.