More information
About iCORA + Working with iCORA
About iCORA
iCORA is an online database for refindings of colour ringed and radio tagged Common Cranes (Grus grus) in Europe.
The iCORA website offers the possibility to report observations of individually marked cranes. After that, the life history of the reported crane is shown.
We strongly recommend to use the Firefox web browser or at least Internet Explorer 7.
The project is managed by the nonprofit organisation Crane Protection Germany. Crane Protection Germany is supported by Lufthansa environmental sponsorship and is a working group of World Wide Fund for Nature Germany and Nature and Biodiversity conservation Union
The realisation of iCORA is supported by Norddeutsche Stiftung für Umwelt und Entwicklung (NUE) from yields of the lottery BINGO! Die Umweltlotterie.
You can find more detailed information about ringed cranes here.
Up-to-date records of 970 cranes ringed in Germany and Poland are in the data base. A long-term goal is the entry of all cranes ringed in Europe. Until then we will send your reports of cranes ringed in other countries to the appropriate ringing centre.
For questions and notes please use our contact form.
Working with iCORA
Before reporting a crane, you have to register. After registration you will receive an e-mail with an activating link for your account. After activating your account, you just need to enter your login data for the next visit.
After login you can immediately report ringed cranes. First select "Report ringed cranes" in the menu.
Afterwards select the observation locality by a "click" into the map.
Press "further" to go on to the general information form. Please enter date and time of the observation. If you like, give details on the habitat. Most important is the selection of the "family size" of your banded crane/cranes. If there are serveral banded family members, iCORA needs the family size to make the next form and to save the family relations between the banded cranes. In the next form "Colour ring - photos" you can report all ringed cranes of the observed family and upload photos. Press "Enter colour codes" to report the colour combination and so on.
The colour code is numerically encoded as follows:
1 = white
2 = yellow
3 = red
4 = blue
5 = green
6 = black
E.g. 441342 means at the left leg blue-blue-white and at the right leg red-blue-yellow (read top down)
After entering the data of all ringed cranes in this family press "Send data to iCORA". After that you get the information whether your crane is in the database or not. If it is in the database, you can immediately find information about the crane under the menu option "My cranes". If the colour combination was not found in the database we will contact or inform you.
After login you can immediately report radio tagged cranes. Select "Report tagged cranes" in the menu and mark your observation locality in the map with the blue iCORA ring.
Press "further" to go to the frequency report form. Please enter date and time of your observation. The accuracy of place is set to 3.1 miles, because normally when you only heard the transmitter, the accurate position of the crane is unkown.
Then you can enter the first received frequency in field "Frequency" and if necessary make some notes for us in the field "Remarks". Press "+ add frequency" to add the frequency to the list of frequencies. Repeat this for all frequencies you received at this place and then press "Send Data to iCORA".
After that you get the information whether your crane is in the database or not. If it is in the database, you can immediately find information about the crane under the menu option "My cranes". If the crane was not found we will contact or inform you.
In the map you can choose the position of the bird or your tracking position.
Test the different map functions to find places or to input coordinates.
When you have found the location click in the map to mark this place with a blue iCORA ring. iCORA will calculate the coordinates and if possible a reference place. Press the "further" button to go on to the next form.
Under this menu option you can find the recorded information about the crane you reported. All refinding localities are displayed on a map. Simply select a colour code or frequency from the selection list. In the table on the right all previous reports are listed. If you choose one of this entries you will see detailed information in the map.
