Meet the Cuckoos
Clement - the BTO Cuckoo
On our first day of catching (19 May 2011) we were lucky enough to catch four birds. Despite catching two birds early on in the day we could not tag them as both were too light to take a satellite tag. We knew catching five Cuckoos was not going to be an easy task but given this, catching enough big Cuckoos suddenly seemed impossible! However persistence paid off and fittingly enough, our third bird, caught at the BTO Nunnery Lakes Reserve, was big enough and Clement the ‘BTO Cuckoo’, was our first bird tagged. He has been named after BTO's director, Andy Clements.
Martin
Martin was also caught on 19 May 2011, the first day we attempted catching. After a dawn start, we now moved to an area on the edge of the estuary in Great Yarmouth. A bird had been heard calling and reacted well to tape on previous recces and so we were hopefull! Catching was complicated by the strong wind blowing the nets over half way through but the taped call brought the bird in and he turned out to be a stunning adult male. This bird has been named Martin, after Martin Hughes-Games, as the Springwatch Team have been very supportive.
Lyster
Lyster and Kasper were both caught on the same morning on 25 May 2011 in an area just on the outskirts of Martham deep in heart of the Norfolk Broads. After having the nets up by 03.15, we soon knew that we had a good chance of catching a bird as there were at least 6 birds in the area. We soon caught a female – one we could not tag! Soon enough though, we caught a male and this became our third bird. Whilst processing this bird, Kasper also flew into the nets as we were just putting to the finishing touches to the tag. Lyster has been named after Simon Lyster who chairs the corporate responsibility committee for Essex & Suffolk Water, the project sponsors.
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Kasper
Kasper was caught on the same day as Lyster in an area near Martham, in the heart of Broadland. We were just finishing off putting the previous tag on and there was a knock on the car window - we had a queue of Cuckoos! This was another successful day, with three birds caught, two of which were large enough to be tagged. The area was perfect Cuckoo habitat – areas of reedbed, scattered scrub and wet grassland. Kasper has been named in thanks to Kasper Thorup, who came over from Denmark to train BTO Scientists to put on these new tracking devices.
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Chris
After our success at Martham, a prolonged period of strong wind meant that we were pretty late in the season to catch our last bird. The number of potential sites in Broadland was drying up and at least 2 of the birds previously tagged had moved more than 10km from where they were tagged so we were worried the birds might have finished breeding. A recce in Thetford Forest soon located a singing bird which reacted strongly to a tape and on June 1st we set nets around a low bush. The resident male was there immediately but kept high in the trees. After making us wait for an hour and a half, a young male came in and the incumbent male started to chase him. The resulting chase ended up with the young male in the net and this was our final bird. This Cuckoo has been named after Chris Packham as the BBC Wildlife Fund have funded much of this work. You can hear the excitment of how we caught Chris in the BBC Radio 4 series Saving Species here
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Now its up to the Cuckoos to tell their story.
