Solar veered

Long-billed Curlew "Solar" changed his mind on returning here, maybe. He was headed this way from California but veered East to Kalispell.

I posted on the Montana birding yahoo group in case anyone there could go look for him and low and behold someone did! They saw him, and maybe his new mate, and got pics of him eating a fat worm. Sweet! Thanks, Dick Walker! Great to know he is fine and has company. We shall see if he returns here or tries out a different place.

Meanwhile, Pine and Mojo were snapped on Skookumchuck Prairie and pics posted on eBird. Remote stalking is awesome! Getting out there and seeing for yourself is fun, too! Argyle is out there somewhere.

Pine heading back

Curlews returning?

Yay!  First movement of the return of the Skookumchuck Prairie IBA Long-billed Curlews returning from their wintering grounds in California.

Pine was the first of the satellite-tagged curlews to head south last year.  SHE left Skookumchuck 21st of June 2017 and headed to Enterprise, Oregon for a bit.  Then, after another couple of days stop near Arok, Oregon, she headed over Nevada for California, arriving closer to where she wanted to be for the winter, which was near Cimarron, Calif., on 27 June 2017.

She's been hanging pretty close to either side of Hanford since then.  Now, she's heading back!  Where will she go?  Will she return here or go somewhere else!

Who will be next?  Mojo was the next to leave Skookumchuck last July. Then Solar. Then Argyle.  Will they reverse their chronology?

There is still a foot of snow on the fields close to my home.  In the Kootenay River valley bottom the snow is a bit thinner, but not by much!

Curlew Update 4 July 2017

Mojo the Long-billed Curlew 

set out from Skookumchuck Prairie IBA at 9:30 pm on the first of July, 2017 following two females, Mildred and Pine, who left the area on the 21st of June.  All three birds flew straight toward Enterprise in northeast Oregon.  Mildred and Pine stopped at Enterprise for a bit before continuing on to California, but Mojo went past, turned southwest along the Malheur River, a tributary of the Snake River, and managed to find some agricultural fields out in the middle of nowhere, for goodness sake.  His last co-ordinates placed him south of Juntara, Oregon.

Mojo flew past the fields where Mildred and Pine took a breather

Mojo found some fields, Granite Creek Road, Juntara, Oregon

Equina

What fate has befallen Equina?  Her transmitter has not been transmitting since 29 June and today I found a very small pile of curlew feathers beside the highway near her last known co-ordinates between Moan and Ford Roads.