Iristu is returning to Siberia (Thursday, March 18, 2004)
At last! Iristu started to get back home after his wanderings in Gujarat. Satellites localized him 500 kilometers away from the wintering grounds this night.
Unfortunately, we do not know when exactly he started to fly. His battery satellite transmitter has not been "feeding" us with quality data as we would wish it to. However, Iristu slowly started to head for home during the weekend or on Monday, "speeded up" yesterday or the day before that...
In the beginning I used the term "at last". This at most describes my feelings and not the fact that the storks would be staying in India unusually long time. There's no reason for hurrying up to Siberia now. Coincidentally, I received a letter today from Nikolai Yushkov. He states that the weather in the south of Novosibirsk is variable. For instance, on February 17th the temperature was +3 °C, February 18th -30 °C... and a week ago -10 °C.
Altynai is still staying in the western Madhya Pradesh, but her return probably won't be long...