Roller Coaster Ride

European Rollers – like so many other species – face a multitude of challenges on migration

- Ryan Truscott

Italian conservationists have for the first time tracked a male European Roller Coracias garrulus from his nest site north of Rome to his wintering grounds near Namibia’s Etosha National Park – and then all the way back again.

The bird’s epic eight-month-long journey – covering about 16 000 kilometres – was recorded using a tiny solar-powered tracking device and his progress was electronically etched in small red and white dots on a GPS map. That image has been likened to ‘a pearl necklace on the Mother Continent,’ said Valeria Jennings, a researcher with Ornis Italica, the Rome-based conservation group behind the study.

Tracking devices, each weighing approximately 3.5 grams, were fitted onto the backs of four European Rollers. Only one of the devices was recovered, the one that went as far as Namibia on a bird the researchers dubbed the ‘Bracciano Roller’.

In May that roller was seen sitting on a fence post in Lazio, central Italy, close to his old nest site. He was one of the first rollers to arrive back after having left the study area in September 2018.

The research has revealed some fascinating details. For instance, the roller travelled at a height of about four kilometres and at a speed of 113 kilometres an hour across the Sahara. On his return trip via Tunisia, he crossed 800 kilometres of open sea in just more than a night, ignoring easier flyways such as the Sicily Channel.

European Rollers are rare in Italy (there are only about 2000 individuals in total). The researchers hope the data they gather on the birds’ habitat choices and movements both in Italy and Africa will help with conservation efforts.