We are grateful to Evergy, our local electric company, for supporting our research in two main ways. First, they have assisted with infrastructure that makes our installations possible. At the Browning, Davidson, Far West, Burroughs-Johnson, and KU Field Station, crews have erected an unused power pole in the location we specified, and in some cases, even grounded the pole, making installation of the mast and antennas that much simpler. We are incredibly grateful for this contribution! Second, we recently applied (successfully!) to Evergy's Community Impact Program. Those funds will help us install one new station (location TBD) and allow us to purchase tags for ongoing research efforts. In a project like this, such contributions are incredibly valuable and will have lasting impact on conservation and science.
It’s International Bat Week AND its Halloween, so we had to let you know about our bat project! The
expanding Motus network is allowing us to track Gray Bat migration for the
first time. The Gray Bat is a federally endangered species that reaches the
westernmost limit of its range in southeast Kansas. The bats migrate each
spring and fall between their summer roost near Pittsburg and hibernation caves
in Missouri and Arkansas. However, little is known about the timing of
migration, routes taken, or connectivity among caves. Pitt State student Braidy
Hunt is working with Andrew George to tag the bats prior to their fall
departure from Kansas. So far, they have attached tags to 40 Gray Bats, and
they have placed CTT nodes at most known hibernation caves in Missouri. If all
goes well, they will be able to link the Kansas colony to specific Ozark caves.
More than half of our tagged bats have already been detected by up to four stations
in the Motus network (very exciting!). Special thanks to Giorgia Auteri and the
MSU Bat Lab, Shelly Colatskie from MDC, and all of the other bat biologists who
came out to help with sampling this fall!
30 Oct 2024
The field season is over and the data analysis has begun. On Konza prairie, MS student, Logan Anderson, with the help of our fantastic team of technicians (Gloria Gibler, Noelle Schumann, and Sam Schermerhorn) mapped the territories of nearly 40 Grasshopper Sparrows, captured them and placed CTT tags on them, and completed an innovative experiment with them. We learned a lot, and I won't say there weren't a few disappointments! (A few birds lost their tags or disappeared soon afterward.) However, by in large, it was all a resounding success. The picture on the L shows one of the CTT nodes on top of a pole, acting like a mini motus receiver, and the picture on the R shows one of 3 experimental cedars placed on half of the territories. Now comes the other hard part... crunching all that data!
5 Sept 2024
The moment I've been waiting for has arrived! In the past week, Alice Boyle and MS student Logan Anderson (KSU) tagged their first 4 Grasshopper Sparrows on the Konza Prairie. These are the first of 40 that we plan to tag this season--each wears a small solar-powered tag from CTT that not only communicates with the network of towers, but also these local grids of "nodes" which are really mini-recievers. Logan is experimentally testing ideas about how and why woody encroachment drives down the abundance of grassland-dependent species. These tags will also allow us (hopefully!) to detect the scales and patterns of their movements outside of the Konza Prairie, this season and beyond. Stay tuned for a more thorough description of his innovative experiment!
29 May 2024
We are delighted to thank our newest partner! The Burroughs Audubon Society of the Greater Kansas City area has generously contributed funds to support the installation of a station in Osage Co. This county is on the East side of the core Flint Hills and not too far West of the greater metropolitan area. We are in the process of locating an ideal spot for this tower and expect to install this station -- along with at least 2 more -- in the coming spring/summer months. In the meantime, we are seeking a donor to help support the partial costs of an installation in Anderson Co. Does anyone know someone motivated to make a difference for conservation of our local grassland-dependent birds in this way? Please get in touch! kansasmotus@gmail.com
13 Mar 2024
Kansas
Motus recently partnered with Prairie State Park to install our first station
in Missouri. Why Missouri? The park’s unique status as the largest remaining
tallgrass prairie landscape in Missouri makes it ideal for comparisons with
more intact grassland landscapes, such as the Flint Hills of Kansas. It is also
REALLY close to the Kansas border; the station’s
detection radius extends into Kansas and partially covers the only known Gray Bat
colony in the state. Ten Gray Bats were already detected by the station in the
week after they were tagged in late October! Even though this is one of our newest
installations, it has detected some fall migrant birds already including a Sora
tagged in IL, American Kestrel (MN), White-throated Sparrow (BC-Canada), Sprague’s
Pipit (MT), and Franklin’s Gull (ND). Thank you MO state parks!
21 November 2023
This week, Rex Buchanan from KPR did a great little spotlight on our newly-deployed station at the KU Biological Station! If you missed it, you are can read or listen to the segment here!
22 Sep 2023
Over the summer of 2023, Kansas Motus made huge progress on developing our infrastructure! We installed new stations at the KU Field Station, on a private property near Olsburg, at the Ross Natural History Reserve, at Prairie State Park (actually just over the state line in MO), and at Fort Leavenworth. There are an additional four in progress right now, so with those installed by others in Kansas, we will be up to 17 stations in Kansas. That is pretty phenomenal given that all of this has been achieved without major funding or dedicated personnel. It is a testament to the committments of so many of you who care about grasslands, birds, and support local science and conservation. I want to thank the Williamsons (Lawrence), the Jefferies (Olsburg), Wichita Audubon, the Kansas Ornithological Society, Evergy, and the Kansas Association of Zoos for helping us financially, making these installations possible.
There is exciting tracking news... but that news can wait for a future date. If you'd like to sign up for email updates from Kansas Motus, join our google group directly (KansasMotus) or pop us an email and we'll add you directly.
29 August 2023
In February, we had a chance to update our local natural resources professionals on the status of this project. To the left is the poster which includes our most recent map... so many installations planned and FUNDED that we hope to get up and running in the next few months.
13 March 2023
On 8 April 2022, Dr. Auriel Fournier (pictured, right) captured a Virginia Rail at her field site at the Forbes Biological station in Illinois. She is an expert in rails, and has deployed 74 motus tags on this species so far. The rail hung around Illinois for a while, and then on 23 May, it got started a big flight, being detected the same day in SE Iowa, then "off the radar" (no stations!) until pinging 2 stations in central Saskatwewan. Still heading NW, the bird disappeared into boreal forest for the rest of the summer, presumably breeding in some, nice, buggy bog. On 26 September, however, our little rail was detected 3 times over the course of a single night. First, she flew past the Konza Prairie, then pinged the two newest receiver stations in in our network! Both the Flint Hills NWR and our new Emerald City installation detected this guy within a week of installation! The latest from our rail is that it is passed near Galveston TX on 17 October... on its way, where, I wonder? Ain't motus great?
2 Dec 2022
Many exciting developments have occurred recently! The Bird Conservancy of the Rockies installed a new station at Kirwin NWR in the North Central part of the state, and several others have moved into production phase or have committed to making this happen in the next year. At this point, we have at least 19 in the works in the state! The next one to be installed will be at a private property in SE Kansas. The landowner has graciously allowed us to use the installation and his property to host a training workshop! We have dubbed this installation, the "Emerald City" for obvious reasons! We will be firming up a date very soon, so if you are interested in participating, then please let us know by filling out this short survey, and sending me an email (aboyle [at] ksu.edu).
18 July 2022
We are so excited by the positive response to our recent efforts to launch this project and to provide a public face our our work via this website! Lots of developments in the works including two new stations in Kansas being built this summer by the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies. One will be in Eastern Kansas at the Flint Hills National Wildlife Refuge, and we hope to use this as an opportunity to train local scientists and technicians to build our own stations in the near future. The other new installation will be at Kirwin NWR which will also support grassland bird research in the north-central part of the state. Watch this space for new developments in the works!
16 March 2022