African Odyssey Project - Black Stork Migration and Ecology Presented on Internet

Miroslav Bobek 
Czech Radio, Vinohradska 12, 120 99 Prague 2, Czech Rep.; e-mail mbobek@cro.cz

The African Odyssey project, utilizing satellite telemetry and other modern technologies, represents the conjunction of both scientific and education goals. Individual Black Storks - or even whole families - became main characters of "series" with many parts to be continued. The medium of the African Odyssey project was from its start almost exclusively radio transmission. Increasing use of the Internet has gradually opened the door for many new possibilities. Since the beginning of 1997, first texts, maps, pictures and sound files of African Odyssey have appeared on the server of Radio Prague (http://www.radio.cz). Neither the structure of the page nor its organization backgrounds allow to update the information available. The above fact was the reason for preparing a new Internet site "African Odyssey" (http://capi.internet.cz) in summer 1997. The site has been updated till now.  New texts and pictures appear on its front page almost daily. Any visitor can be sure to find a huge file of schedules, texts, photos, animations and sound files that can serve as an illustration of various aspects of the project. The site is visited mostly by students, educators, scientists, conservationists, journalists and technicians. Children and retired people who learn to use the Internet in general are also among the visitors of the site. The web pages called "Kristyna Live" (http://kristyna.rozhlas.cz) were started in May 1998. Live video transmission from a Black Stork´s nest was presented on the pages for 86 days. The pages reached enormous number of visits not only from the Czech Republic, but also from abroad. Interactive web pages "Storks Online" (http://capi.fido.cz) were established in September 1998. Updated coordinates of tracked Black Storks are being published there several times per day. During the migration period, any Internet visitor is able to see current position of particular storks, to create simple maps (whole passage or a selected part only), to assess distances the storks have flown, etc. Finally, web pages called "Expedition to West Africa" (http://praha.rozhlas.cz/capi) were established on the occasion of an expedition to wintergrounds of radio-tracked Black Storks in December 1999 and January 2000. The pages daily brought online reports firstly from Senegal and subsequently from Mauritania and Mali. These reports were not only texts, but they also include visual and audio files. As far as the African Odyssey project is concerned, using of Internet cannot be reduced to provide the  general public with the information. Sharing the information within the research team and processing the data are of the same importance. Non-public system called "Stork Laboratory" started to be used in January 1999. The "Stork Laboratory" collects all the satellite data. It uses different subsystems including map generator, which enables to project selected coordinates into simple maps. Each team member can also create various partial files where additional notes can be put in. The files and notes are online accessible to the other team members.