The migration routes used by this species have been determined by band recoveries in part. The Bird Banding Laboratory can give banders permission to use radio transmitters to track individual birds. The radios may be on a standard research frequency for tracking local movements or the dispersal of young birds from the area where they were raised. Some researchers are using satellite transmitters on birds which allow the researcher to track the bird anywhere on the earth. A wealth of information can be learned from using satellite radios, but they are expensive and although technology is allowing them to be made lighter and lighter, the bird must still be a relatively large species to be able to carry a satellite transmitter at this time.
Many researchers use banding as one tool in their studies of bird populations and communities.
The Bird Banding Laboratory can give banders permission to use additional techniques to study birds, including markers that are more visible than the metal service bands. Some banders use colored leg bands to mark individual birds and study their local movements and behaviors from a distance. Individual identification of birds allows many things to be studied without handling the bird again. More About Auxiliary Markers Determining Life Span Banding allows the determination of the minimum length of time that an individual bird lives. Without an individual marker, there would be no way to determine if the Cardinal that is outside my window is the same bird that I saw last year or not.