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Turkey Vulture Migration Project...
Project Acknowledgements:
As with all large-scale projects in raptor
migration science, many people have helped make our work possible. Mr.
Sarkis Acopian had the foresight to fund our early studies on Turkey Vulture
migration from 2003 to 2007. More recently his wife, Bobbye, has decided to
continue that level of support of our efforts through early 2010. Without
this foundational support our work would have never gotten off the ground.
Falcon Research Group (FRG) President, Bud Anderson, with whom we have
collaborated on FRG’s Southern Cross Peregrine Migration project, provided
the human resources necessary to help Hawk Mountain Sanctuary develop the
webpage you are now visiting, which allows us to the show the world where
Turkey Vultures do and do not go. Without Bud’s keen and continuing support
of our efforts much of what we have learned would be far less widely
distributed.
The Jessie Ball duPont Foundation in Jacksonville, Florida, is providing us
with funds that allow us to bring the results of our work into dozens of
third-grade classrooms through eastcentral Pennsylvania.
David and Sandy Junkin, the Falkland Islands Government, The Edinburgh Zoo,
and, most of all, Falkland’s Conservation under the capable guidance of
Grant Munro, have contributed considerably to project field work in the
Falkland Islands, where University of Minnesota graduate student, Brandon
Breen is focusing his efforts on the ecology of a high-latitude,
non-migratory population of Turkey Vultures.
Cornell University graduate student Jamie Mandel, continues has work as
technical manager for the program, as well as lead scientist in studies of
energy management in migrating vultures and head model developer for vulture
movements.
Our colleague Ed Henkel helped train project personnel in the whys and
wherefores of trapping and handling of Turkey Vultures early on, and we
remain grateful for his efforts in this regards.
Adrian Naveda and his colleagues at the Maracaibo Zoo in northwestern
Venezuela, have assisted us by wing-tagging and measuring more than 100
North American Turkey Vultures over-wintering there.
Costa Rican hawk-watcher and photographer extraordinaire Marco Saborio,
helped locate and photograph one of Stuart Houston’s satellite tagged birds.
Marc Bechard trained our Canadian colleagues in the application of satellite
transmitters.
Stuart Houston, Geoff Holroyd, Brenton Terry, Mike Blom, Marten Stoffel, and
Karin Machin, in Saskatchewan capably partnered with us in trapping,
tagging, and tracking Canadian breeding Turkey Vultures who have
over-wintered as far south as Venezuela.
Peter Bloom and his team have trapped and tagged Turkey Vultures for us in
southern California, several of which have over-wintered in Central America.
Finally, Hawk Mountain’s own David Barber has been the logistic coordinator
and data manager for the project since day one. More recently David has
worked with FRG’s Mark Prostor and Don McCall in bringing this website to
life.
That said we apologize in advance to others who have helped the project and
are not mentioned here. Please let me know if I have mistakenly done so.
In sum, the project owes its successes not only to the birds themselves and
the satellite tracking devices that we have used to follow them, but also to
dozens of collaborators on the ground, who, in working together, have
allowed us to see into the heart of this great New World migration.
Keith L. Bildstein, April 2008
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