By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Columnist

Each year in late April, the Pacific golden plovers head north after spending the winter in the Islands.

On O'ahu, their departure is like clockwork, always within a day or two of April 25.

But scientists aren't sure whether the plovers — known in Hawai'i as kolea — follow the same pattern on the other islands of Hawai'i and the Pacific.

A group of zoologists is enlisting the public's help to find out. You can find information about their Kolea Watch program at the Web site.

University of Hawai'i graduate student Gustav Bodner said the group hopes that people across the state and across the Pacific will check in at the Web site and take a few minutes each day to count the kolea they see in a neighborhood region.

The idea is to check the same area each day, watching for how many birds are present and noting when they finally disappear. The information can be entered directly at the Web site, which contains lots of information about the animals.

The plovers are generally solitary birds when they are in their winter headquarters. One kolea will chase other birds out of its territory, and it is rare to see the birds in pairs or groups.

All that changes as they prepare for the long flight to their summer nesting turf in the tundra of Alaska. Suddenly, the kolea become downright gregarious. A large field that may have held one or two birds will hold a dozen or more, and eventually vast flocks congregate in preparation for the group departure.

Among the questions scientists hope to answer is whether the birds on other islands may be joining up with the O'ahu birds in flight, and perhaps whether birds from other parts of the Pacific are in flight at the same time the Hawai'i birds are.

Bodner said plovers from as far south as New Zealand and Australia may be flying north to the same region as those from Hawai'i.

The scientists are interested in getting sightings from there, and from any island in the Pacific where people see the birds.

Bodner said he's interested in kolea for a number of reasons.

One is that they are among the few native birds most people are likely to see on a daily basis. Bodner is working to involve schools in the Kolea Watch effort, both to enlist their assistance in making reports and because it's a way to involve kids in the native environment.

Too, these birds are Olympians of the avian world.

"These birds are champion migrators," Bodner said.

Their 3,000-mile, nonstop flights across the North Pacific are stunning, as are their flight speeds of 50 to 60 mph — and that's without the help of the wind.

"With a good tailwind, they might be doing twice that," he said.

Jan TenBruggencate is The Advertiser's Kaua'i bureau chief and its science and environment writer. Reach him at (808) 245-3074 or jant@honoluluadvertiser.com.