The end of Argentina and a good start in Uruguay

I think we are done with photos for a while... my only internet access is at the local cafes (hence my lack of recent posts) where uploading a photo would be nothing short of an arduous project. If I find a wi-fi cafe somewhere near my new digs I´ll be sure to catch you up on the images. I wrapped up banding in Argentina one week ago, Sunday and spent one day walking around the Recoleta neighborhood of Buenos Aires (beautiful!) and enjoyed a truly carnivorous meal at restaurant La Estancia. Then, I set back to work in the office and taking care of more logistics for a couple of days. We were set to depart Buenos Aires for Montevideo via ferry on Wednesday afternoon (after hiring a flete [moving truck for hire] to haul all the equiment from INTA to the port) but there were delays (as usual) and we were held up at customs so the trip was delayed until the following morning. In spite of this, I enjoyed my one night stay at the Port du Sol Hostel. Faced with the same logistical issues of having too much equipment for a regular car, I spent hours looking for a rental car and arranging for transport of the equipment to Tres Cruces bus station for shipping to La Paloma after arriving in Montevideo. After shipping everything, I ended up renting truck that is one step up from the battery powered tonka trucks that kids drive around in their driveway... Julian had the task of driving it 200km from Montevideo to La Paloma where we are banding....not a fun trip but it keeps us laughing. Last night was the first effort at banding here in Uruguay at Laguna de Rocha and we were highly successful catching ten birds of five different species!! Amazing!! I (nor my faithful assistants) didn´t go to bed until the sun came up! This is only the beginning and things are looking good......

Anillos Los Chorlos!!!!

After much frustration (and anxiety on my part), we finally captured shorebirds and focal species to boot! The original team of four Argentine biologists switched out last Tuesday and a fresh group of three women joined us at Estancia San Joaquin. After training with “yard birds” we split into two groups. The day group goes out with Peter to drop-net and the night group goes out with me to nite-lite. The drop net is a net raised 4 feet parallel to the ground. It is dropped remotely using a trigger line. It has proven successful in a variety of habitats including wetlands and dry uplands. When we nite-lite we use a 100,000,000 candle power spotlight with 12V bulb with external battery and throw net to rove around the fields, rice and cattle pastures alike and look for birds. Birds have no eye-shine and we are looking only for shapes. In the last couple of nights the moon is full and too bright for nite-liting so we are adjusting to work during the day in the rice fields for the next week. Both groups have been successful but capture numbers are nothing like migration. Here we are happy to catch one or two birds in each group. On migration you can get up to twenty a day!! Here it is a whole other ballgame. So far, the totals are: P.dominica-2, T. subfuficollis-7, C. melanotos-6, C.fuscicollis-6, C. collaris-5. We have only five days left here. Heavy rains have completely altered the conditions and we are scrambling to adjust. Enjoy the pics!