The hectic global journey of a satellite-tagged Amur Falcon has become a subject of curiosity for ornithologists, as the feathered species reached Manchurian Bay in China on 20 May after flying around 6,000 kilometres in 18 days from a forest in Odisha.
The bird had a three-day sojourn in a forest in Odisha from 30 April to 2 May after covering around 4,000 kilometres from Southern Africa. It has now been tracked at Manchurian Bay in China, said Dr Suresh Kumar, a scientist at the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) in Dehradun, on Tuesday.
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The falcon was earlier sighted at Karlapat Wildlife Sanctuary in Odisha’s Kalahandi district on 30 April. Later, on 1 May, satellite tracking found the bird in a forest about 30 kilometres from Phulbani. A day later, it was tracked in a forest in Dhenkanal district, added Dr Kumar.
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From Odisha, the bird flew to Bangladesh and Myanmar. It also crossed the Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea in China during its long flight and reached Manchurian Bay, in northeast China, on 20 May. In total, the bird has flown around 10,000 kilometres in the last six months. The male Amur Falcon was tagged with a satellite transmitter on 8 November 2024 in the Tamenglong district of Manipur by WII scientists to track its migration path, said Dr Kumar.
This bird species, sighted mostly in the north-eastern state of Manipur, is roughly the size of a pigeon. It is a long-distance, trans-equatorial migrant bird and faces threats from habitat loss, hunting, and illegal trapping.
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