Migratory Bird Tower

In September 2020, Blackstone Lake became part of an international research network that is helping to improve protection for migratory birds and insects. Thanks to the generosity of Heather and John Mallett, and the work of the Georgian Bay Land Trust and Birds Canada, the lake is now home to a Motus wildlife tracking station that will contribute data on Blackstone Lake’s species to cutting-edge scientific studies.

The Motus Wildlife Tracking System is arguably the world’s most ambitious wildlife tracking initiative. It consists of over 900 receiving stations in 31 countries, which have provided data to 340 and counting scientific studies. Motus works by attaching tiny radio-transmitting tags to animals including birds, bats, and large insects. The tags’ signals are picked up by strategically located receiving stations like the one on Blackstone Lake. Each tag has a unique signal which identifies the individual specimen; this identification can be linked to information collected at the animal’s initial capture such as when and where it was tagged, species, gender, and body condition. The Motus system allows researchers to track the movements of animals as they migrate without ever having to recapture the individual, making it a highly effective way to gather data.

The Motus project is developing brand new knowledge about animal behaviour that will help to inform habitat conservation around the world in the years to come. Studies done through the Motus system are helping researchers learn more about migratory routes and the connectivity between breeding, migratory, and wintering habitats, understand bird ecology and how environmental factors influence migratory success, and much more. This information is critical as scientists work to understand and reverse the alarming population declines in birds and other migratory species that are being observed around the world. The North American bird population alone has shrunk by an estimated 3 billion birds, or 25%, since 1970. 

The Georgian Bay Land Trust is a conservation organization that has been working, over the last four years, to bring Motus towers to their protected properties in order to learn more about local species and contribute to international conservation efforts. They are supporting a local study on Eastern Whip-poor-wills and Common Nighthawks, both species at risk, and their nine Motus towers have already contributed data to at least 23 additional projects, on species as diverse as the Barn Swallow, Red Knot, and Eastern Red Bat. The more that can be learned about the behaviour and needs of these species, the better we can identify key habitat to protect to halt population declines.

Blackstone Lake’s new Motus tower sits on a high point of land owned by Heather and John Mallett, where it will be able to pick up signals from animals passing up to 15km away. This land is part of a 134-acre conservation easement, Estelle’s Reserve, that the Malletts established in 2018 with the Georgian Bay Land Trust. Placing a conservation easement on their land is the Malletts’ way of ensuring that the land will never be developed, even in future years when ownership passes on to new landowners. Through their generosity, the Malletts have protected forever an unbroken stretch of forest and wetland habitat along the shores of Blackstone Lake that is home to at least three species at risk. We are so grateful to them for taking this extra step to ensure that the legacy of their gift will be felt by species throughout the region for years to come.

More information about Motus can be found at www.motus.org, and about the Georgian Bay Land Trust at www.gblt.org. If you would like to see the data that the Blackstone Lake Motus tower is recording, visit www.motus.org/data/receiversmap, and use the map to zoom in on the Blackstone Lake tower. Click the yellow dot symbolizing the tower, and in the box that pops up, look for “tags detected” and then click “table”.