Post-fledging Dependent Behaviour, Dispersion and Migration of Young Eastern Imperial Eagles from Slovakia as Revealed by Satellite Telemetry

Abstract

In 2005, five nestling Imperial Eagles (Aquila heliaca) were fitted with battery-powered GPS Satellite Transmitters (PTTs) in Slovakia to study their behaviour after fledging, two of them in the east and the other three in the west of the country. The PTTs (LC4s made by Microwave Telemetry, Inc. USA) had one of the batteries removed to reduce the weight, and weighed about 90g. A total of 598 GPS fixes were received. The number of locations varied between 45 and 244 per bird, the tracking periods between three months and one year. From a female (PTT 59281, “Stefani”), a total of 110 GPS fixes were acquired during 23 August 2005 – 26 August 2006.

Keywords

• birds of prey
• imperial eagle
• aquila heliaca
• migration