Final Field Season Update

After 2 months of searching for Golden-wings with bands and geolocotars, we successfully relocated 5 banded birds (part of a control group without geos) and recovered 7 geolocators.

 

Anna with a returned bird and its recovered geolocator

It's amazing! 7 birds flew around with a geolocator for a whole year. They made the journey from the Northwoods of Wisconsin to their wintering grounds in Central or South America then ended up back in the same exact habitat patch in Wisconsin the following May, where we were able to recapture them. Bird migration is incredible!

The 7 returned geo birds were fitted with new geolocators. This will allow us to look at annual differences in individual Golden-winged Warbler migration routes. An additional 4 geolocators were fitted on new male Golden-wings to gather additional migration data.

 

A male Golden-winged Warbler with his new geolocator

We will return to Wisconsin next May to relocate the birds and recover the geolocators and their data.

I know what you're all thinking, you want to know "where did they go!?!" Unfortunately the data recovered from the geos is a string of thousands of light-level values which looks a bit like this.....

 

Downloaded light-level data will need further analysis and processing before migration routes and wintering locations can be determined

There is no geographic or location data directly recorded. I have to run codes and analyze the data to translate the light-level values into geographic information. This is my project for the fall! So please stay tuned and I will be sure to share what I find out in the near future.

It was a successful field season and I'm very excited to start the analysis process and learn more about Golden-winged Warbler migration! Thank you for all of your support and interest in my research.