The 2024 research field season kicked off early, with our arrival in Nebraska in April to study the movement behavior of cliff swallows while they are selecting colony sites. We put radio-transmitting lifetime tags on some birds to track their movement locally as they assessed and settled at colonies.
The tags are part of the Motus Wildlife Tracking System, so if the birds pass near a receiving station elsewhere in the world they will also be detected. Olivia Pletcher is taking the lead on applying this new technology, attaching the transmitters to the birds and analyzing the results, but we caught the birds for tagging using our old-fashioned drop-netting methods that go back to 1984! We will continue to monitor these birds throughout the 2024 summer breeding season.