Biodiversity: installed on high-voltage lines, storks are increasingly difficult to ring

That morning in the Brière marshes (Loire-Atlantique), a special operation awaited the technicians in charge of line maintenance. A couple of storks have taken up residence on a pylon. A long time absent of the Loire-Atlantique, today there would be 300 nests, including a hundred on high voltage lines. “We had to learn to live together, we learned to move the nests”, explains Laurent Gérard, responsible for the maintenance of the 44 network.

11 pairs of storks in France in 1974

The nests have impressive dimensions: more than 1.50 meters in diameter, and 300 kilos for some. One by one, the young are taken from the nest. The storks will be weighed, measured and above all ringed. “In 1974, there were 11 pairs of storks left, only in Alsace. We were on the verge of extinction, and then from the mid-90s, the storks will start to come back with Spanish storkses”explains Hubert Dugué, ACROLA program manager. The storks, the time to muscle their wings and feed themselves, will take off around mid-July towards sub-Saharan Africa.