Is it breeding?

For much of the past month, locations from one of the Steppe eagles we are tracking have been within a 10 km diameter circle (about 520 km SW of Astana), raising the question of weather it had settled in to breed (spending some or most of its time on a nest).  I don't think so, though it could have, then abandoned the breeding attempt.  The reasons I think that it is not breeding is that it would still be fairly young (its entering its 3rd yr), and in recent days it has moved about 20 km to SSE.  That would mean that it settled in that 10 km circle for only three weeks or so, too short to incubate eggs.  Also, because its most recent move has kept it away from that circle for about 4 days, I think it had just found a good place to dwell for some time, and has now moved on.

The other eagle we are tracking has not been heard from since 22 March.  I am still hoping it is in a GSM hole somewhere, and will at some point leave that hole and start transmitting data. We have a lot of catching up to do.

Locations of a 3rd yr Steppe eagle during May 2018.

1-10 May 2018

Well, it seems like 162312 has settled into a summering area, which is very remote.  Its about 90 km NNW of Baykonyr, Kazakhstan.  It's hard to say much about this area except that it seems very remote.  Looking at Google Maps its hard to find nearby active towns or even roads, and I had to zoom out quite a bit to find a recognisable geographic feature, the Aral Sea, which is about 400 km SW of where this bird has settled.

We haven't heard from the other steppe eagle for a while.  Presumably it has been in an area with no GSM network.  Hopefully, it will be heard from soon, and at least at the end of the summer when it starts autumn migration.

Apparent summering location of steppe eagle 162312