Monday 22 February 2016

Great Southern Loop


Just like our mighty Wedge-tails, this year is flying fast! As January merged into February, Kuyurnpa continued her trend of popping back to Matuwa on occasion, and gradually consolidated her use of the northern and eastern shores of the enormous Lake Carnegie. The last time she spent so much time in this area was back in October 2014, when she crossed Matuwa after a long stint at Roy Hill and spent 3 weeks along the southern edge of lake Carnegie.

Then, to scratch some apparently very itchy talons, Kuyurnpa decided to spend the second week of February completing a 6 day, ~1100km loop towards Kalgoorlie, west and north to Menzies and Leonora, and back north to Wiluna. The distance between her roost sites on the embarking date (11th February) was ~300km, and on 16th February, she flew 200km in one day to roost just south of the Matuwa boundary. This journey took her further south-west than she has ever travelled! I am very interested to know whether this Arid Zone-born eagle will ever enter the Mediterranean Zone (the south-west corner of WA) - her most recent journey certainly had her coming close! We'll only find out with more eagle tracking!

Kuyurnpa's recent journey saw her roost just 600km east north-east of Perth.