BirdLife News-Bytes

08-04-2009

Stories in this BirdLife News-Byte: Israel's national bird; Invisible Connections; Tana Video Out Now; RSPB's Garden Birdwatch; Brazilian IBA gets own book; Large-billed Reed-warbler (not so) new to Afghanistan and Kazakhstan

Israel chooses Eurasian Hoopoe as its National Bird - Eurasian Hoopoe Upupa epops has been awarded the title of Israel's National Bird by President Shimon Peres. The colourful bird will be celebrated with the issue of new coins and stamps. The initiative to choose a national bird in Israel began two years before the celebrations for Israel’s 60th birthday by the Israel Ornithological Center, the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (BirdLife in Israel) and the International Center for the Study of Bird Migration. The 'National Bird election' events helped to raise public awareness of nature conservation and the protection of birds and their habitats.

Invisible Connections – ‘Invisible Connections’ is an account in three languages (Korean, Chinese, English) of the journey made by migrating shorebirds flying from their breeding grounds along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, one of the most heavily-developed and populated flyways on the globe. Published by Wetland International, it profiles the particular importance of the Yellow Sea - between China and Korea - as a critical staging site for migratory shorebirds in their annual north-south-north migrations. For more information visit Wetlands International’s website by clicking here.

Tana Video Out Now! The Tana River Delta is amongst the top three of Kenya's largest and most important freshwater wetland systems, with a significant local community of cattle herders and others dependent on it. However, the Tana River Delta is threatened by a proposed sugar and biofuel project. The video below is the first of a sequence of 14 entitled “Is Tana's Sugar Really Sweet?” that have been produced by to illustrate the problems faced at the delta. To watch all the excellent videos, please click here.

Watch more BirdLife Videos by clicking here.

Record-breaking half a million people take part in RSPB's 30th Big garden Birdwatch - More than 552,000 people took part in this year’s Big Garden Birdwatch, the annual event organised by the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK), counting over 8.5 million birds. A total of 73 species were recorded in 279,000 gardens across the UK over the weekend of 24 and 25 January. And the Long-tailed Tit Aegithalos caudatus has flown into the top ten for the first time in the survey’s 30-year history.

Brazilian IBA gets own book - The Parque Nacional do Cabo Orange (Cape Orange National Park), located in Amapá state, north Brazil, comprises a strip of coast 200 km long, in addition to a 10 km wide marine zone. Aiming to raise the profile of this biodiverse area, the Centro Nacional de Pesquisa para a Conservação das Aves Silvestres, CEMAVE (National Research Center for the Conservation of Wild Birds), have published Guia de Campos: Aves do Parque Nacional do Cabo Orange. This is the first book published about the park and it will be an important tool in raising local awareness. The Parque Nacional do Cabo Orange is considered an Important Bird Area (IBA) and will be included in the book Áreas Importantes para a Conservação das Aves no Brasil – Parte 2: Amazônia, Cerrado e Pantanal, to be published by BirdLife/SAVE Brasil in 2009. To find out more click here.

Large-billed Reed-warbler (not so) new to Afghanistan and Kazakhstan - According to a recent paper in the Journal of Avian Biology by Svensson et al. Large-billed Reed-warbler Acrocephalus orinus can be added to the bird lists of Afghanistan and Kazakhstan, after finding 10 new specimens in museum collections. The Kazakhstan specimen was collected by N. Zarudny on 18 August 1900 in the south-east of the country. The four Afghan specimens were collected by W. N. Koelz in north-east Afghanistan in July 1937. Until recently Large-billed Reed-warbler was known only from one specimen, collected in the Sutlej Valley, Himachal Pradesh, India in November 1867. In March 2006 one was trapped at Laem Phak Bia, Phatchaburi Province, south-west Thailand. To read the full story click here.

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