Update on Aylal

Aylal is continuing to travel to sites further and further south. This time, it spent the whole of 20th November in a coastal area about 20 km south of Aglou, which is the southern-most limit of the Souss-Massa National Park. Being gregarious, Aylal is not alone but has been travelling with a group of other ibis, thus this monitoring is providing important data on population level movements.
Nevertheless, it continues to return to the same roost it  used recently in a rugged cliff within the National Park.

Southward Bound

After returning from its' trip to the Tamri area on 31st October, Aylal moved southwards, beyond the mouth of the Oued Massa.Early in the morning of November 5th it was very close to the southernmost border of the Souss Massa National Park. It seems that it had travelled too far to return to its' usual roosting spot and so had stayed overnight in the area, probably with other ibis.
Aylal's behaviour is providing us with a lot of information on the patterns of movement and habitat use of this species and we hope to enhance out knowledge even more by tagging more individuals in the future.
Nader has been a bit less adventurous lately and didn't join Aylal for the journey southwards, staying instead in the northern area of the National Park.

Aylal's escape

Aylal, the adult ibis tagged with the GPS transmitter, made a getaway to the Tamri colony last Sunday (30th) and spent the night there before returning to the Souss Massa National Park on Halloween. Nader didn't follow its parent, confirming that although the birds are using the same feeding and roosting areas, they are now independent.

Although we are missing some data on Aylal's journey up north, on its return to its feeding grounds in the National Park it flew almost 60 km between two consecutive records, which equates to an average speed of at least 30 km/hour. This is the most northerly point reached by Aylal since it was tagged in July, and it actually went beyond the colony to some feeding grounds in the north where it has probably bred in the past.