Waterbirds around the world

A global overview of the conservation, management and research of the

world's waterbird flyways

Edited by G.C. Boere, C.A. Galbraith and D.A. Stroud

Assisted by L.K. Bridge, I. Colquhoun, D.A. Scott,

D.B.A. Thompson and L.G. Underhill

EDINBURGH, UK: THE STATIONERY OFFICE

Extract only - complete publication at www.jncc.gov.uk/worldwaterbirds

© Scottish Natural Heritage 2006

First published in 2006 by The Stationery Office Limited71 Lothian Road, Edinburgh EH3 9AZ, UK.

Applications for reproduction should be made to Scottish Natural Heritage,Great Glen House, Leachkin Road, Inverness IV3 8NW, UK.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 0 11 497333 4

Recommended citation:Boere, G.C., Galbraith, C.A. & Stroud, D.A. (eds). 2006.

Waterbirds around the world. The Stationery Office, Edinburgh, UK. 960 pp.

Names used for geographical entities do not imply recognition, by the organisers of the Waterbirds around the world conference or othersupporting organisations or governments, of the political status or boundaries of any particular territory. Names of territories used (andany alternatives) are included solely to help users of this publication apply information contained within this volume for waterbird conservation purposes. The views expressed in papers included within this volume do not necessarily represent views of the editorsor the organisations and governments that supported the conference and this publication.

Cover photography: Whooper Swans Cygnus cygnus arriving at Martin Mere, England. Photo: Paul Marshall.

(www.paulmarshallphotography.com)

Copyright of all photographs used in this publication resides with the named photographers.

Extract only - complete publication at www.jncc.gov.uk/worldwaterbirds

ABSTRACTIn April 2002, backpack PTTs were fitted to three GreaterFlamingos Phoenicopterus ruber roseus at two sites in northernTanzania. To maximise battery life, the transmitters wereprogrammed to send signals for 12 hours at intervals of 192 hours.All three batteries lasted into 2004, having provided more than 24months of data. This paper maps the recorded movements of thethree birds, comments on each individual and raises issues relatedto the conservation of the species within Tanzania and Kenya.

BACKGROUNDSatellite transmitters have revolutionised our understanding oflarge animal movements at the level of the individual (Meyburg &Lobkov 1994, Hughes et al. 1998, Stuwe et al. 1998). Advances intechnology have enabled lighter transmitters to be fitted to anincreasing range of species but weight constraints are still a signif-icant issue. However, the most significant drawback remains that ofcost. The transmitters alone are far from cheap and the addeddownload and computer time means the technology still remainsbeyond everyday use. Movements of a few of the larger wetlandbirds between the Western Palearctic and the Afrotropics havefeatured in most studies undertaken to date in Africa (Berthold etal. 2001). Movements of waterbirds within the Afrotropical Regionare still largely conjectural but advances have been made in recentyears with long-term studies of Lesser Flamingo Phoeniconaiasminor in southern Africa (McCulloch et al. 2003) and East Africa(Childress et al. in press). More recent studies have focussed onAbdim’s Stork Ciconia abdimii between the breeding grounds inthe northern Tropics and wintering grounds south of the equator,mainly in Tanzania (Flemming Pagh Jensen, pers. comm.).

During discussions about knowledge gaps with colleagues atthe Max-Plank-Institut für Ornithologie Vogelwarte Radolfzellthe possibility arose of redirecting three transmitters from theirWhite Stork project and fitting these to Greater Flamingos. MPIRadolfzell duly provided the transmitters and the downloadcosts while the Tanzanian Bird Atlas Project provided logisticalsupport and capture of the birds. The birds were tagged with

battery powered satellite backpack transmitters. These werePTT-100 platform transmitter terminals (PTTs) from MicrowaveTelemetry (USA) weighing 45 g. Each unit was programmed toemit a signal for 12 hours duration at intervals of 192 hours. Thetransmitter was attached to the bird’s back as a backpack by acontinuous strip of a 3.5 mm nylon rope with the 250 mmantenna angled backwards and free.

The PTTs transmitted with an impulse of 53 seconds, thelength of one impulse was about 300 millisecond. Each impulsecontained information in code regarding identification number,battery level, temperature and activity. The signals were received850 km above the earth by NASA-satellites of the TIROS-seriesand forwarded to the ARGOS ground-station in Toulouse,France. ARGOS then calculated the PTT location using dopplershift analysis and their own algorithms, and the processed datawere received at Radolfzel by email.

The Argos computer system assigns a ‘location class’ (LC)to each data record. Poor weather and low battery conditions canadversely affect signal reception by the satellites and thereforebirds can not always be located with the same degree of accu-racy. There are seven LCs of which only the four most accurate(from 150 m to 1 km) were used.

TRAPPING METHODS Slipknots made from 0.5 mm clear fishing line were attached atintervals of 30 cm to 50 m lengths of nylon rope. These lineswere sunk in shallow water in a ‘V’ formation and held in placeby locally occurring stones. The trap lines were under constantsurveillance throughout and birds were removed within minutesof being caught. The two females were fitted with metalnumbered rings from the East African Ringing Scheme (avail-able rings were not large enough for the male bird) and redplastic rings. Standard measurements including weight weretaken from all birds and are given in Table 1.

The transmitter + harness weight of 48 gm represented1.75%, 2.06% and 2.34% of body weight, well within therecommended limit of 5%.

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Movements of three Greater Flamingos Phoenicopterus ruber roseusfitted with satellite transmitters in Tanzania

N.E. Baker1, E.M. Baker1, W. Van den Bossche2 & H. Biebach3

1 Tanzania Bird Atlas Project, PO Box 1605, Iringa, Tanzania. (email: tzbirdatlas@yahoo.co.uk)2 Co-chair WI / IUCN SSC Storks, Ibises & Spoonbills Specialist Group, Heindonksesteenweg 277, 2830 Willebroek, Belgium.(email: wimvandenbossche@yahoo.co.uk)3 Max-Planck-Institut für Ornithologie, Von der Tann Str. 7, 82346 Andechs, Germany. (email: biebach@orn.mpg.de)

Baker, N.E., Baker, E.M., Van den Bossche, W. & Biebach H. 2006. Movements of three Greater Flamingos Phoenicopterus ruberroseus fitted with satellite transmitters in Tanzania. Waterbirds around the world. Eds. G.C. Boere, C.A. Galbraith & D.A. Stroud.The Stationery Office, Edinburgh, UK. pp. 239-244.

Table 1. Biometric data from the three birds.

Date Site Ring Species Age Sex Weight (g) Wing (mm) Tarsus (mm) Remarks

30/3/02 Manyara - Phoenicopterus ruber AD M 2750.0 424.0 340.0 27187 - Leo

7/4/02 Magadini W0902 Phoenicopterus ruber AD F 2330.0 380.0 264.0 27188 - Jane

18/4/02 Magadini W0903 Phoenicopterus ruber imm F 2050.0 397.0 275.0 27186 - Paola

LOGISTICS There was much debate on where to catch the birds. Core

areas would perhaps provide more insight into movements formost birds but those in peripheral areas would perhaps movegreater distances. In the end, financial and time constraintsdictated that birds should be captured in core areas close to theRift Valley in northern Tanzania.

The first location of choice was Lake Manyara which is wellknown to hold significant numbers of flamingos. Much of thenorthern shallows where the flamingos feed occur outside LakeManyara National Park and are subject to considerable distur-bance from fishermen, tourists and bird catchers (Baker & Baker 2002). During the visit in March 2002 the latter wereparticularly active, trapping Yellow-billed Storks Mycteria ibisfrom the adjacent active breeding colony and even BlacksmithPlovers Vanellus armatus and Chestnut-banded SandploversCharadrius pallidus for the apparently insatiable export market.Levels of disturbance were such that flamingo flocks wereseverely agitated and it proved difficult to herd them in the direc-tion of the trap lines. During discussions with one of the birdtrappers it was established that several Greater Flamingos hadbeen caught in recent weeks and were being held in a house inMto wa Mbuu, the nearest village. The Park Ecologist from LakeManyara National Park, who had accompanied us in the field,quickly located the house and we negotiated to purchase (foronly $10) the largest and healthiest bird from the dozen or sowalking around an empty room in a recently constructed house.It is not appropriate to go into detail here concerning the birdtrade, but suffice it to say that the smear lines on the walls clearly

indicated that this particular room had held numbers of birds ofvarying heights for many days.

The second site of choice was to be Lake Natron, known tobe a breeding site for the Greater Flamingo but far more impor-tant for Lesser Flamingos. Large numbers of Lesser Flamingowere present at all the surveyed areas of this lake and much timewould have been lost attempting to target the fewer GreaterFlamingo present in those areas which were accessible.

We chose not to trap birds within protected areas and it wasdecided to limit our search to those lakes known to regularlyharbour smaller numbers of birds. Magadini is a small, seasonalrainfed alkaline lake between Mounts Meru and Kilimanjaro andbarely 10 km from the Momella Lakes within Arusha NationalPark. This lake is known to hold numbers of both flamingospecies on a regular basis. It was also only a few kilometres fromour home base at the time on the south-west slopes of Mt.Kilimanjaro.

RESULTSThe movements of the male bird tagged at Lake Manyara areshown in Fig. 1.

It must be emphasised that during the 192 hr interval any ofthese birds could (and most probably did) move considerabledistances. The straight lines on the maps link sequential accuratefixes and do not therefore even pretend to map flight paths. Thisshould be taken into account when interpreting the maps.

As this was the first bird caught and tagged and he had beenheld in captivity for an undetermined number of days, there wereobvious concerns about his well-being. However, within minutes

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Fig. 1. Satellite tracking of three Greater Flamingos April 2002 to June 2004: Leo.

of being released he appeared to be walking and feedingnormally within a small flock of some 80 birds. During subse-quent observations he was seen to preen the antenna and did notappear to be disturbed by it, the backpack transmitter or theharness. Worthy of note is that he may have spent some 418 daysat Bogoria, was the only bird to visit Logipi in the far north nearLake Turkana, and that he did not visit the coast.

The movements of the adult female bird tagged at Magadiniare shown in Fig. 2.

This bird was the only one of the three to visit Lake Burungiand may have stayed on this small lake for nearly two months.She was also the only bird to visit Empakai Crater lake withinthe Ngorongoro Conservation Area, although this was only asingle fix so her visit was a short one. Perhaps the most inter-esting of her movements was the visit to Rasini Bay in coastalKenya. This single fix indicates a stay of no more than 15 daysand it could have been far less than this. Lake Manyara wasobviously important to this bird during the two years with apotential long single stay and many return visits.

The movements of the immature female bird tagged atMagadini are shown in Fig. 3.

The long stay of this bird on Lake Manyara seems at first tobe quite remarkable. Fixes were so close together for so manyweeks that it was feared she had died and we were seeing simpleerrors in accuracy. Equally, her long stay on the Kenyan coastwas also surprising but due to the long intervals between fixes itis not possible to draw firm conclusions from these two longstays as single sites. There is no significant wetland withinseveral kilometres of the fix on the 8 May 2004 and at a time of13:12 GMT this would not suggest a bird on a long overlandflight. Lake Chala, a small steep sided crater lake (unsuitable forflamingos) is some 15 km to the north-east of this fix and LakeJipe (which would be suitable as a stopover site) is 20 km to thesouth-east. The shortest distance between Elmenteita and MidaCreek on the Kenyan coast is 520 km but it cannot be stated fromthese results that this distance was covered in a single flight.

Habitat usage on Lake ManyaraMany of the flamingo lakes within the Rift Valley are quite smalland little can be inferred from satellite tracking movement ofindividual birds due to inaccuracies inherent in the methodologyand the lack of choice when birds are disturbed for any reason.However, the results mapped here for Lake Manyara show quiteremarkable individual choice of habitat selection within the lake.

Fig. 4. details the 81 fixes from all three birds during theirvisits to Lake Manyara.

Of the 45 fixes for Jane, 40 (88%) were from the southernhalf of the lake with two clear concentrations in the south-east.Yet only one fix from 16 and one fix from 20 were recorded forLeo and Paola respectively from this part of the lake. The latteris actually well to the southeast of the lake and she may well

Table 2. Movement summary for Leo, the adult male: 100usable fixes from 30 March 2002 to 21 June 2004 - 813 days.

Leo 27187

date date location Days

30.03.02 15.06.02 Manyara 78

22.06.02 22.06.02 Elmenteita ?

30.06.02 31.01.03 Bogoria 216

07.02.03 10.03.03 Elmenteita 32

18.03.03 18.03.03 Natron ?

26.03.03 10.05.03 Manyara 45

18.05.03 02.06.03 Natron 15

10.06.03 10.06.03 Elmenteita ?

18.06.03 18.06.03 Bogoria ?

25.06.03 03.08.03 Elmenteita 40

10.08.03 12.12.03 Bogoria 125

19.12.03 11.01.04 Elmenteita 24

03.02.04 20.04.04 Bogoria 77

28.04.04 06.05.04 Logipi 9

21.05.04 21.06.04 Elmenteita 33

Five sites over 814 days

Table 3. Movement summary for Paola, an adult female: 69usable fixes from 18 April 2002 to 9 April 2004 - 721 days.

Paola 27186

date date location days

18.04.02 06.06.02 Magadini 50

14.06.02 15.09.02 Arusha NP 94

23.09.02 23.09.02 Manyara ?

01.10.02 17.11.02 Arusha NP 48

25.11.02 24.05.03 Manyara 181

no further fixes until

18.09.03 18.09.03 Manyara ?

04.10.03 04.10.03 Burungi ?

12.10.03 12.10.03 Manyara ?

19.10.03 13.12.03 Burungi 56

21.12.03 21.12.03 Empakai ?

06.01.04 06.01.04 Manyara ?

14.01.04 14.01.04 Rasini Bay ?

21.01.04 09.04.04 Natron 79

Seven sites over 721 days

Table 4. Movement summary for Jane, an immaturefemale: 95 usable fixes from 21 April 2002 to 9 June 2004- 779 days.

Jane 27188

date date location days

07.04.02 21.04.02 Magadini 15

29.04.02 29.04.02 Nyumba ya Mungu ?

06.05.02 29.12.02 Manyara 238

03.01.03 03.01.03 Natron ?

08.01.03 04.05.03 Manyara 117

12.05.03 20.05.03 Natron 9

28.05.03 07.08.03 Elmenteita 72

14.08.03 14.08.03 Mida Creek ?

22.08.03 22.03.04 Rasini Bay 211

08.05.04 08.05.04 ? ?

24.05.04 09.06.04 Manyara 17

Seven sites over 793 days

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have been on her way to Lake Burungi. Ten of the 16 fixes forLeo are in the far north-east section of the lake, close to wherehe was caught and released and although 17 of the 20 fixes forPaola are in the same general area they are clearly well to thesouth of the habitat preferred by Leo.

Long intervals between fixes make it difficult to be moredogmatic about these results but these three birds clearly showedindividual choice in their usage of this lake.

CONSERVATION IMPLICATIONS These comments relate only to the lakes visited by these

three birds and not to all the lakes in East Africa utilised by theGreater Flamingo.

The importance of Lake Manyara to this species cannot beover emphasised. Of special note here is that these birds spendthe majority of their time in the eastern and southern portions ofthe lake that are not included within the National Park. Theentire lake area should be protected as suggested in the nationalImportant Bird Areas inventory (Baker & Baker 2002).

Although only one of the three birds utilised Lake Burungithis lake is known to be seasonally important to both flamingospecies (Baker 1997, Baker & Baker 2002) and it is surely anoversight that this lake has not yet been incorporated intoTarangire National Park lying as it does just outside the currentprotected area boundary.

That Lake Natron is critical for the entire Rift Valley popu-lation of Lesser Flamingos is well understood (Mlingwa &Baker 2006) but it is less clear how significant this lake is to the

much smaller population of Greater Flamingos although it doesappear to be a regular breeding site for this species too. All threetagged birds used the lake to varying degrees and its status as aRamsar site should prevent undue damage to this uniqueecosystem. However, renewed calls to exploit the soda ash andthe threat of a tarmac road through the valley certainly givecause for concern.

Lake Bogoria is protected as a National Reserve managedby the local county councils and as such is free from unduedisturbance (Bennun & Njoroge 1999).

Lake Elmenteita is largely protected by private ownership(Bennun & Njoroge 1999) but requires some formal protection,perhaps best served for now by bringing it within the RamsarConvention.

Rasini Bay is used here to denote two small bays along thesouthern shoreline of Ungwana (Formosa) Bay in coastal Kenya.Rasini is the southern most bay and Fundisa a few kilometers tothe north. Within the context of this study and accepting the limi-tations imposed by the 192 day signal interval, Jane spent211 consecutive days here between August 2003 and March2004. In contrast Paola visited this part of the Kenyan coast forless than two weeks giving a single fix on 14 January 2004.Little is known about this site and only the northern shorelinewas included in the Kenya Important Bird Areas (Bennun &Njoroge 1999). It would seem worthwhile to include the wholeof this area in future waterbird counts and in particular toconduct regular counts of Great Flamingo here to ascertain theimportance of this site to this species.

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Fig. 2. Satellite tracking of three Greater Flamingos April 2002 to June 2004: Paola.

Fig. 3. Satellite tracking of three Greater Flamingos April 2002 to June 2004: Jane.

Fig. 4. Satellite tracking of three Greater Flamingos during visits to Lake Manyara, from

April 2002 to June 2004: Leo; Paola; and Jane.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSThe generosity of Peter Berthold and Ulrich Querner of theMax-Planck-Institut für Ornithologie Radolfzell in providingtransmitters, download costs and computer time is fullyacknowledged and very much appreciated. NEB acknowledgesthe research clearance afforded by the Tanzania Commissionfor Science and Technology. We thank Emilion Kihwele, thePark Ecologist at Lake Manyara National Park for accompa-nying us in the field while working on the shores of LakeManyara.

REFERENCESBaker, N.E. 1997. Tanzania Waterbird Count: the first co-ordi-

nated count on the major wetlands of Tanzania. WildlifeConservation Society of Tanzania. Dar es Salam.

Baker, N.E., & Baker, E.M 2002. Important Bird Areas inTanzania. Wildlife Conservation Society of Tanzania.Dar es Salaam.

Bennun, L. & Njoroge, P. 1999. Important Bird Areas inKenya. Nature Kenya. Nairobi.

Berthold, P., van den Bossche, W., Fiedler, W., Gorney, E.,Kaatz, M., Leshem, Y., Nowak, E. & Querner, U.2001. Der Zug des Weißstorchs Ciconia ciconia: einebesondere Zugform auf Grund neuer Ergebnisse.Journal fur Ornithologie 142: 73-92.

Childress, B., Hughes, B., Harper, D., Van den Bossche, W.,Berthold, P. and Querner, U. in press. East Africanflyway and key site network of the Lesser FlamingoPhoenicopterus minor documented through satellitetracking. Proceedings of the Pan African OrnithologicalCongress XI, 20-25 November 2004; Djerba, Tunisia.

Hughes, G.R., Luschi, P., Mencacci, R. & Papi, F. 1998. The7000-km oceanic journey of a leatherback turtle trackedby satellite. Journal of Experimental Marine Biologyand Ecology 229: 209-217.

McCulloch, G., Aebischer, A. &Irvine, K. 2003. Satellitetracking of flamingos in southern Africa: the importanceof small wetlands for management and conservation.Oryx 37(4): 480-483.

Meyburg, B.-U. & Lobkov, E.G. 1994. Satellite tracking of ajuvenile Steller’s Sea Eagle Haliaeetus pelagicus. Ibis136: 105-106.

Mlingwa, C. & Baker, N. 2006. Lesser FlamingoPhoenicopterus minor counts in Tanzanian soda lakes:implications for conservation. Waterbirds around theworld. G.C. Boere, C.A. Galbraith & D.A. Stroud (Eds.),The Stationery Office, Edinburgh, UK. 230-233.

Stuwe, M., Abdul, J.B., Mohd, B. & Wemmer, C.B. 1998.Tracking the movements of translocated elephants inMalaysia using satellite telemetry. Oryx 32: 68-74.

Lesser Flamingos Phoenicopterus minor feeding at Lake Nakuru, Kenya. Photo: Sergey Dereliev.