Arrived: 14th human-led northern bald ibis migration successfully completed with many highlights
Newsletter 03/09/2021
On September 1st, after a journey of 14 days, we arrived with 28 human-raised juvenile Northern Bald Ibises on the edge of the WWF protected area Oasi Laguna di Orbetello in southern Tuscany. Already during landing, wild bald ibises joined the group of juvenile birds. They have reached the Northern Bald Ibis winter area. This will be their home, where they will stay for the next two or three years until they will return on their own to their breeding area in Austria to raise their own offspring.
The time has come to say goodbye for the two foster mothers Helena Wehner and Katharina Huchler. For five months, they spent day after day with the birds. During this time, not only did the juvenile birds developed a close social bond with their human foster parents, this bond is mutual. Thus, the foster mothers are glad that their birds are now integrating into this migrating European population but yet the thought of having to leave these birds in a few days hurts.
Rain fronts, thunderstorms and difficult wind conditions influenced the course of migration. Planning the flights over such long distances and such difficult terrain has never been as demanding as this year. But our professional pilot Walter Holzmüller, which participated in this project as a pilot for already the twelfth time, knew how to choose the right day for all five flight stages of the migration and so we reached the winter area in five fantastic flight stages and without incidents.
The five flight stages led over a distance of 770 km. The Pfitscher Joch (2,246 m) at the transition from the valley Zillertal to South Tyrol could be overflown at an altitude of more than 2,800 meters. At a small airfield in Neustift near Brixen, unfavourable wind conditions forced us to take a break of four days. In return, on the following flight stage past the Dolomites to Thiene on the edge of the Po Valley, thanks to the supportive tail wind, the flight formation reached the highest average flight speed ever with a mean of 58 km/h and a maximal of up to 78 km/h.
The two pilots agree that the real heroes of this migration were the 28 young birds and their foster mothers. We have been able to continuously optimize the methodology of human-led migration over the past few years. But we didn't expect that the Northern Bald Ibises would ever fly as motivated and reliable as this year. Even in the difficult terrain of the Alps and the Apennine, the birds followed reliably. They mostly flew in perfect, energy-saving formation, but also used thermal updrafts which carried them and the aircrafts up to the glacier region of the Zillertal Alps.
Illegal hunting in Italy remains a major threat to the Northern Bald Ibis population. The risk of being shot down also affects these 28 young birds after their release. Foster mother Helena Wehner remembers to a fatal accident during flight training, which felt like the loss of a friend. Helena states: The idea that one of our birds being hunted illegally and having to die such a senseless death is very bad for me. This not only jeopardizes the survival of this species but also extinguishes a hopeful life.
Photo: Arrived! Foster mother Katharina Huchler, projekt manager and pilot Johannes Fritz, foster mother Helena Wehner and pilot Walter Holzmüller.
