Since 2006, we have conducted conservation-focused research on the breeding ecology of pallid and Montagu's harriers in central Asia in cooperation with the Naurzum Nature Reserve (North-central Kazakhstan) and the National Aviary of Pittsburgh (USA). Click here to navigate to our project page.
The pallid harrier, Circus macrourus, is a migratory raptor that breeds from the Volga River eastwards through the Urals, southern Siberia, northern Kazakhstan and north-western China. Its main population strongholds are in southern-asian Russia and northern Kazakhstan, which host c. 87 % of the world population. The population has declined in recent decades mainly on its western range distribution limits. Local declines have also been reported in Central Asia. The pallid harrier is classified by IUCN as a Near Threatened species.
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Figure 1. Movements by a female pallid harrier fitted with a satellite-received transmitter. between mid October 2007 and mid Apil 2008. ( white points and track: southward migration route, blue points and track: northward migration route). |
Declines have been mainly attributed to breeding habitat degradation, leading to degradation of nesting habitat and reduction in prey availability, but migratory birds are also very sensitive to wintering conditions and it is known that the loss of high-quality wintering areas can influence breeding success during the following season. Wintering distribution of this species and the connectivity between breeding and wintering subpopulations is poorly known. Land-use transformations have also resulted in large-scale loss of dry grasslands and savannahs in Central Africa and India, the main wintering areas of this species. This project will identify the links between breeding and wintering populations, with the use of long-lived satellite-transmitters, and determine if the population dynamics of this species is affected by winter conditions.
In 2007, as a consequence of a low vole abundance year, breeding density of pallid harriers in the study area was very low ( only 4 breeding pairs), and we could only fit one female with a satellite-transmitter. However, tracking of even this single female has so far yielded interesting information on its migration behaviour.
At the end of the breeding period (by mid August), this adult female left the breeding area and moved north-east, settling in an area about 800 km from its nesting area on the border with Russia about 15 days later. She stayed there for one month, then In early October (very late in comparison with other harrier species) she started migrating in the opposite direction, passing over her nesting area again before continuing south-west. She migrated through Georgia into Turkey, then travelled south into Syria then Iraq. On 10 November she flew through southern Israel near Eilat and headed toward the Sinai. By mid November she had made it to Sudan where she paused for 1.5 months at a site about 150 km east of Khartoum.In late December she moved about 1000 km southwest, into southern Sudan, where she spent the rest of the winter.
Alter spending 3 months in southern Sudan, she left her wintering area on the 23d of March 2008, and quickly travelled 1400km to the northeast. She reached the Red Sea coast on the 29th of March where surprisingly (to us at least) she crossed the Red Sea rather than heading north along the coast to the narrower crossing at Suez. By mid April she was SW of the Aral Sea, apparently headed back to Narzum!. We are tracking another pallid harrier that wintered in India. Click here to see its story.
Figure 1 shows this harrier's journey since mid October. Visit again. We will be updating this site from time to time.
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