Migrant birds in Africa

Sat 10/12/2011 Ed’s arrival

No trapping this morning, straight into the tracking, and only the two birds to find. Despite “losing” bird 1 yesterday (still no sign last evening) bird 2 could also be untraceable today, as they were tagged together. No need to worry however. Both remaining birds have tags with a good signal.

Above photo: enormous spider seen daily when tracking bird 3

The rest of the morning is spent mapping some habitat, and quite interesting too to discover just how the land is carved up between the farmland, scrubby fallow and the remnant forest. There seems to be more of the latter than I would have previously guessed, with the open arable fields making up less than one third of the land area. Much of the scrubby fallow, however, is impenetrable without a machete, due to the dense Chromolaena stands, so the exact acreage of this we can’t yet measure without more work from January.
News filters through during the morning that Emmanuel and Ed have met up at the airport and are on their way, and sure enough at midday they arrive at the local canteen. Despite being undoubtedly tired, Ed is keen to help out in the field and joins us tracking in the afternoon.

Above photo: a somewhat out-of-place leaf-mantis

Friday 09/12/2011 No sign of #1, but #4 is found

Friday morning and one last effort to catch, at least before Ed arrives – we’ll have another go on the 11th, but probably only to colour ring I think. No luck today anyway, so we get on with the tracking. After successfully catching up with birds 2 and 3, Bee and Nick set off from the village to seek out bird 1 in the valley. Japheth and I decide to have a look for bird 4 despite the fact that it wasn’t radio-tagged. We feel that as it is colour-ringed, and so long as it hasn’t moved too far, we have a fighting chance of spotting it. Within a short while we manage to find it, along with 2 others and also 3 garden warblers, foraging at times quite low down to about 2-3m. This is a great result without any radio tag, but then again it had barely moved any distance at all from where it was caught. Like the 3 others, this bird was in a rather poor condition when trapped, so if it does “intend” moving on any great distance it will need to put on weight first.

Above photo: site of capture and resighting of bird #4

We meet Bee and Nick back at the other side of the valley, and they bring news that there was no signal to be heard from bird 1. In this case we feel that it may well be possible that it has moved on. It is also perfectly possible for the tag to have finally expired, however, some 14 days since it was switched on.

Above photo: colourful bugs in valley forest

News from poor Ed is that his onward flight from Rome is delayed, so he expects to get to Accra well after midnight. It could be worse though. And it gets worse! Later in the evening Bee learns that his flight is delayed until the early morning, so he is now due in Accra when Emmanuel is due to leave at about 8am – so he’s going to get picked up from the airport and straight into the field tomorrow.

Thurs 08/12/2011 An un-taggable tail

Above photo: the team can't resist snapping the sunrise

On Thursday we pop the nets up at the latest new spot. We get a response from the playback straight away, and after about 45 minutes (including changing the playback from song to just call!) we ensnare our fourth wood warbler. But, there’s a problem! Close inspection reveals that it has no central tail feathers. These are vital for us to be able to attach a radio tag, so after all that effort we cannot put the radio tag on! One positive from this is that if the bird was close to moulting these feathers, had they been present and we’d attached the tag, it may have been dropped within a day or so anyway. Also, with time running out for this phase before the Christmas break, we’re also running out of opportunities to get much data from a newly placed tag.

Above photo: wood warbler wing showing extent of moult

Weds 07/12/2011 Nick returns

No luck catching on today, and after tracing birds 2 & 3, I drop Bee and Japheth off to look for bird 1 in the valley. Meanwhile I take a walk along a “new” path to explore a little further beyond the normal areas where we survey, and come across 2 wood warblers along with garden warblers, melodious warblers and spotted flycatchers. It clearly looks worth a punt at catching here. Nick gets back to us later in the afternoon, so we’re now back up to a field-team of 4.

Tuesday 06/12/2011 Chas’s last day

Chas’s last morning, so of course we all set out catch a wood warbler for him (and us!) Operating two nets as before, and ever hopeful, we do manage a catch. Well, a single African thrush anyway! No wood warblers though, despite one responding to the playback, calling away in the nearby trees. The tracking of the 3 others is a success though, so thankfully Chas got to see one of our wood warblers post-tagging.

Above photo: Chris and Japheth tracking bird 1 from a clearing

So after lunch at the university canteen in Abetifi, Emmanuel took Chas back to Accra, with his flight back to the UK later this evening. Sad to go I expect, especially with tagged nightingales still roving around at Nsoatre! However, when Emmanuel comes back on Saturday, Bee will then head back to the nightingales for one last week of tracking, along with boyfriend Ed who’s arriving on the 9th. Meanwhile were all looking forward to seeing Nicholas again, who we hope will be joining us in Pepease tomorrow now that he's fininshed his exams.

Above photo: Japheth and Bee tracking bird 1 from the ridge in the evening

Above photo: fieldwork is taking it's toll on the team!!

Monday 05/12/2011 Visa extension and team expansion!

We set two nets with playback in the most promising spot from Sunday’s survey, but after almost an hour and a half we had caught no further birds. Things are beginning to look a lot trickier for catching now. Not sure why this should be, seeing as we had so much luck with our first two attempts.
We pack up from the field and head back to camp, as with 60 days on my visa running out soon, I need to get an extension stamp from the nearest immigration office, which is in Koforidua. And with the nightingale team packing up today and heading to join us, we need to be back sharpish. Meanwhile our landlord Ola is heading off back to Accra, but has very kindly agreed to all 6 of us staying in his house for the night, which is fantastic.

Arriving in Koforidua at the immigration office just after midday, we are told that the officer in charge is absent until 2pm, so we file the paperwork, head for lunch, and return (with fingers crossed - especially seeing as I have handed in my passport!) Back at 2, and thankfully by 3pm all the paperwork is in order, so we head back home. There we meet up with Bee, Chas and Oppong who have already arrived - fantastic to see them all again!

We phone ahead to the local hotel to make sure of our evening meal order, but then as seems to happen every night from about 1830 to 2200hrs, the power goes off. The local hotel has a back-up generator, but they actually call to say this is not working either! We won’t be eating at the hotel, then. Instead we head to Abetifi and have rice and beans by torchlight at Club Afrik. Cheap and not too cheerful! Still, it’s a meal, and I hope a memorable final dinner in Ghana for Chas.

Thursday-Sunday 01-04/12/11 Now failing to catch....

Above photo: fog blankets the study site

Over the next few days we attempt to catch each morning, and after an hour of trying on each occasion we remain on 3 tagged wood warblers – not one more bird caught. We follow this with the tracking of the first 3 birds, and on the Sunday we also undertake a full survey along the usual transect route.

Above photo: misty morning

Above photo: centre of study site with the mist lifting

Above photo: pied hornbill calling

Above photo: late morning, Japheth tracking bird 1 in the valley bottom

Above photo: in denser vegetation making things more difficult

What was interesting from the survey was the lack of wood warblers seen aside from those that we already knew about and had tagged! In fact, bird 3 was spotted 300m from it’s usual spot without resorting to tracking. We did encounter a total of 5 others, in just 2spots. With 4 of these in one place, the Monday morning netting attempt was going to be right next to this spot.

Meanwhile on Sunday we're invited to take lunch with Ola our landlord - a fabulous mix of all sorts of traditional Ghanaian dishes, served up al fresco in the shade of the large gazebo in the grounds. We really shouldn't get used to this!!

Above photo: taking some lunch with the landlord

Above photo: yam, kenkey, rice balls, tilapia and bush-meat, followed by strawberries and icecream!

Bee, Chas and Oppong have begun to wind things up over at the nightingale site, completing the habitat mapping. Amazingly, Chas got to spot a grasshopper warbler during fieldwork, according to the field guide a species not normally found this far south, in fact very rarely encountered in Ghana at all.

The final full site survey was carried out after some particularly damp weather conditions, which totally drenched the vegetation, and made the fieldwork a rather wet job!!