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Autumn Migration of an Amur Falcon Falco Amurensis from Mongolia to the Indian Ocean Tracked by Satellite ANDREW DIXON, NYAMBAYAR BATBAYAR and GANKHUYAG PUREV-OCHIR

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Autumn Migration of an Amur Falcon Falco Amurensis from Mongolia to the Indian Ocean Tracked by Satellite ANDREW DIXON, NYAMBAYAR BATBAYAR and GANKHUYAG PUREV-OCHIR Forktail 27 (2011) SHORT NOTES 81 because they showed: a relatively long, conical bill; heavily chestnut- Dymond, N. (1999) Two records of Black-headed Bunting Emberiza tinged uppertail-coverts and rump; and a dark crown. All three birds melanocephala in Sabah: the first definite occurrence in Malaysia and were aged as immature on account of their pale yellow undertail- Borneo. Forktail 15: 102–103. coverts, fawn underparts and worn yellowish flanks. Earlier published Grewal, B., Harvey, B. & Pfister, O. (2002) Birds of India including Nepal, Sri checklists for Bangladesh list four Emberiza species (see above), but Lanka, the Maldives, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Bhutan . London: none mentions E. melanocephala; hence it can be considered a new Christopher Helm. species for Bangladesh. Grimmett, R., Inskipp, C. & Inskipp, T. (1998) Birds of the Indian Subcontinent . Black-headed Bunting breeds in the western Palaearctic and Iran. London: Christopher Helm. It winters mainly in cultivated fields in southern Pakistan, west and Harvey, W. G. (1990) Birds in Bangladesh . Dhaka: University Press. central India and infrequently eastern Nepal and eastern India, with Husain, K. Z. (1979) Birds of Bangladesh . Dhaka: Government of Bangladesh. a few recent records from Jalpaiguri, West Bengal (S. Sen pers. comm. IUCN Bangladesh (2000) Red book of threatened birds of Bangladesh . Dhaka: 2011). It has a known tendency to vagrancy further east with records IUCN. from South-East Asia in north-west, central and southern Thailand, Khan, M. A. R. (1982) Wildlife of Bangladesh: a checklist . Dhaka: University of Singapore, northern Laos, northern Vietnam (Byers et al. 1995, Dhaka. Rasmussen & Anderton 2005, Robson 2008), southern China, Japan Khan, M. M. H. (2008) Protected areas of Bangladesh: a guide to wildlife . Dhaka: and northern Borneo (Dymond 1999). Nishorgo Program, Bangladesh Forest Department. Rashid, H. (1967) Systematic list of the birds of East Pakistan . Publication no. Acknowledgements 20. Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan. I am extremely thankful to Paul Thompson, Nick Dymond and Alex Lees for Rasmussen, P. C. & Anderton, J. C. (2005) Birds of South Asia: the Ripley guide . their comments on the Black-headed Bunting photos to confirm Washington, D.C. and Barcelona, Spain: Smithsonian Institute and Lynx identification and for their comments on the draft of this paper. I am also Edicions. thankful to Sumit Sen for providing current information on West Bengal Robson C. (2008) Birds of South-East Asia . London: New Holland Publishers, and Assam. I am grateful to Farhad Pavel, M. Abdullah Abu Diyan, Ronald Ltd. Halder, Shimanto Dipu, Zamiruddin Faisal, Samiul Mohsanin, Saniar Rahul, Siddiqui, K. U., Islam, M. A., Kabir, S. M. H., Ahmed, A. T. A., Rahman, A. K. A., Enam Talukder, Shama Hoque, Enam Ul Haque, Mayeen Uddin, Sirajul Haque, E. U., Ahmed, Z. U., Begum, Z. N. T., Hassan, M. A., Khondker, M. Hossain, Monirul Khan and Dilip Das for their wonderful company in the & Rahman, M. M., eds. (2008) Encyclopedia of flora and fauna of field. Special thanks are due to all my colleagues at Bangladesh Bird Club Bangladesh , Vol. 26 . Birds. Dhaka: Asiatic Society of Bangladesh. and Wildlife Trust of Bangladesh for their support and encouragement. Thompson, P. M., Harvey, W. G., Johnson, D. L., Millin, D. J., Rashid, S. M. A., Scott, D. A., Stanford, C. & Woolner, J. D. (1993) Recent notable bird References records from Bangladesh . Forktail 9: 12–44. Ali, S. & Ripley, S. D. (1987) Compact handbook of the birds of India and Pakistan Thompson, P. M. & Johnson, D. L. (2003) Further notable bird records from together with those of Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka . Second Bangladesh . Forktail 19: 85–102. edition. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Byers, C., Olsson, U. & Curson, J. (1995) Buntings and sparrows . Sussex: Pica Sayam U. CHOWDHURY , House- 1 (B-3), Road-7, Sector-4, Uttora, Press. Dhaka-1230, Bangladesh. Email: [email protected] Autumn migration of an Amur Falcon Falco amurensis from Mongolia to the Indian Ocean tracked by satellite ANDREW DIXON, NYAMBAYAR BATBAYAR and GANKHUYAG PUREV-OCHIR Introduction major conservation concerns for the species, although it is known to Amur Falcons Falco amurensis breed in the Eastern Palearctic from be harvested for food during autumn passage through north-east Transbaikalia, Russia and central Mongolia east to Ussuriland (south- India (Naoroji 2006). Satellite telemetry allows the routes of migrating eastern Russian Far East) and south to the Qinling Mountain range in raptors to be mapped (Meyberg & Fuller 2007), whilst the recent central China (Ferguson-Lees & Christie 2001). This small falcon development of lightweight transmitters (<9.5 g) has enabled the undertakes one of the most notable migrations of any bird of prey, technology to be applied to small migratory falcons such as Eleonora’s migrating between its east Asian breeding range and its southern Falcon F. eleonorae (Gschweng et al . 2009, López-López et al . 2009) African wintering range. Amur Falcons depart their breeding areas in and Hobby F. subbuteo (Meyburg et al . 2011). In this paper we describe late August and September and form large migratory flocks, moving the autumn migration pathway of a single Amur Falcon fitted with a south through China skirting the eastern edge of the Himalaya to reach satellite transmitter at its breeding site in central Mongolia as part of north-east India and Bangladesh, where they settle temporarily to fatten a pilot study for implementing the activities listed in the Convention before embarking on the latter stage of the migration through the on Migratory Species (CMS) African-Eurasian Migratory Birds of Prey Indian subcontinent and across the Indian Ocean to equatorial Africa Memorandum of Understanding. (Clement & Holman 2001, Bildstein 2006). The journey of 3,000 km across the Indian Ocean typically takes place in late November and Methods December, aided by the prevailing easterly winds (Bildstein 2006, An adult female Amur Falcon was trapped on 21 July 2009 at its Anderson 2009). nesting site (47°39’43.0"N 105°51’53.8"E, altitude 1,378 m) in the The Amur Falcon is not uncommon across most of its breeding Khustayn Nuruu National Park, Tov Province, central Mongolia. We range, although detailed information on its population status and fitted a 9.5 g solar-powered satellite transmitter (PTT-100, Microwave trends is lacking (Ferguson-Lees & Christie 2001). It is a common Telemetry Inc., Columbia, MD, USA) by means of a Teflon ribbon breeding species in the major river valleys of the forest steppe zone harness (Kenward 2001). The duty cycle of the satellite transmitter of central and eastern Mongolia, where it typically occupies old nests was programmed for 10 hours on and 48 hours off. The total weight of Eurasian Magpies Pica pica for breeding. Currently there are no of the PTT and harness was 11 g. The bird weighed 199 g when 82 SHORT NOTES Forktail 27 (2011) trapped, so the PTT and harness represented c.5.5% of its body Table 1 . Location, timing, distance and direction of female Amur Falcon weight. Its wing length was 228 mm (maximum chord), tarsus 30.9 movements tracked by satellite from 12 September to 28 November mm, tail length 119 mm, wingspan 690 mm, and total body length 2009. 282 mm. After release at the capture site, the bird made several circles Distance/ Location Lat (N)/Lon (E) Date/Time (UTC) Direction overhead and landed on a hill opposite from where we were standing. After resting and making an apparent effort to get rid of Tov Province, Mongolia 48°11'/105°48' 12 Sep/13:04 na Dundgovi Province, Mongolia 45°27'/107°50' 14 Sep/21:29 340 km/152° the transmitter for about five minutes, it took off and flew towards Inner Mongolia, China 40°39'/110°02' 22 Sep/03:09 510 km/161° its nest site. Inner Mongolia, China 40°40'/110°02' 11 Oct/14:39 55 km/156° Satellite data was provided in DIAG format by Argos, extracted Henan, China 34°46'/112°06' 18 Oct/13:51 680 km/163° Ha Tay, Vietnam 29°58'/105°37' 01 Nov/22:57 1650 km/204° using the MTI Data Parser and plotted in Google Earth. Mandalay, Myanmar 21°33'/96°25' 04 Nov/10:28 960 km/275° Manipur, India 23°58'/93°33' 11 Nov/20:10 390 km/313° Results Mizoram, India 24°14'/93°00' 21 Nov/15:24 65 km/296° The coverage period for our satellite tracking lasted 131 days from Bay of Bengal 19°42'/87°51' 24 Nov/01:20 730 km/227° Andhra Pradesh, India 16°21'/79°28' 26 Nov/11:44 960 km/248° the date of deployment on 21 July to the last transmission on 28 Indian Ocean 12°23'/65°36' 28 Nov/16:19 1,555 km/255° November 2009. During this time, we received 58 locations on 29 Indian Ocean 12°03'/63°32' 28 Nov/23:28 225 km/260° days (Table 1). The accuracy of the location data, based on Argos location classes, was generally low (Table 2). Despite the low Table 2 . PTT data for the female Amur Falcon tracked from Mongolia to frequency and quality of location data, we were able to plot the the Indian Ocean. Location classes (LC) assigned by Argos are radial migration pathway of the bird from Mongolia to the Indian Ocean error distances: LC3 <250 m, LC 2 250–500 m, LC1 500–1,500 m, LC0 (Fig. 1). >1,500 m, LCA and LCB unbounded, LCZ invalid. Location data came from within the breeding area in the Khustayn Nuruu National Park until late August, when the bird Loc. Days Locations days LC3 LC2 LC1 LC0 LCA LCB LCZ shifted some 65 km north, between 21 and 31 August.
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