Mountain Quail (Oreortyx pictus) live primarily in areas of dense cover in the wooded foothills and mountains along the West Coast of the United States. In the fall these birds congregate into family groups of up to 20 birds and make their way from their summer home in the mountains, into the sheltered valley below the snowline in the winter. This seasonal journey by the quail may cover distances of up to 20 miles by foot.
The Longest:
A Bar-tailed Godwit (Limosa lapponica) holds the record for the longest known non-stop migration. Using satellite tracking, birds in New Zealand were tagged and tracked all the way to the Yellow Sea in China. According to Dr. Clive Minton, "The distance between these two locations is 5950 miles, but the actual track flown by the bird was 7258 miles. This is the longest known non-stop flight of any bird. The flight took approximately nine days.” Researchers found that the Bar-tailed Godwits flights southward ranged in duration from 5.0 to 9.4 days and from 5950 to 7258 miles. |
The routes of satellite tagged Bar-tailed Godwits migrating north from New Zealand to Korea and China |
Sources:
- Mountain Quail (Oreortyx pictus). The Coastal Scrub and Chaparral Bird Conservation Plan: a strategy for protecting and managing coastal scrub and chaparral habitats and associated birds in California. California Partners in Flight. http://www.prbo.org/calpif/htmldocs/scrub.html
- Extreme endurance flights by landbirds crossing the Pacific Ocean: ecological corridor rather than barrier? http://alaska.usgs.gov/science/biology/avian_influenza/pdfs/Gill_et_al_2008_Godwit_Migration.pdf
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