News

No huddles please for the Galapagos Penguin; this tropical trooper calls the warm waters of the equator its home. But life in paradise is anything but a walk in the sun for the world's rarest penguin...

When we talk about birdsong, we cannot simply refer to a single "voice". It is a great chorus of complex sounds, it is a real language in itself. The dry "teak" of a sparrow, the plaintive "gheck gheck gheck" of a woodpecker, the shrill "chirrip" of a lark – each sound has its own purpose and is used in very specific circumstances. For birdwatchers, learning how to ‘decode’ the secret language of birds is a great way to identify different species and to better understand their behaviour.

How do we conserve birds? By learning from previous threats. Hundreds of species of bird have been wiped out by human activity in the modern era. Here are just a few species that illustrate the major threats still facing birds today.

Vultures are one of the most threatened families of birds in the entire world and their decline has been shockingly rapid. Some species in Africa and the Indian subcontinent have declined by over 95% in the last few decades, a rate faster than even that of the Passenger Pigeon or Dodo.

The gentle giants at Lake Skadar, between Albania and Montenegro, are now video-monitored 24hrs a day and threats can be addressed in real-time. With local communities embracing all things pelican, and nesting success increasing, the time of the pelican is coming again.

When you’re a local Balkan civil society organisation trying to protect nature, your country’s political position on the road to EU accession can have a big influence on what protection to aim for.

For conservationists working to protect the remaining breeding colonies of Dalmatian Pelican on Lake Skadar in the Balkans, the fear of breeding failure is an intensely nerve-racking experience.

The Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF) is funding three projects that are protecting Endangered loggerhead sea turtles.

The International Single Species Action Plan (ISSAP) for the Conservation of the Shoebill Balaeniceps rex is now available. Its overall goal is to increase the Shoebill’s population size and maintain its current range.

Below is shown a list of falcon species. Members of the falcon familiy are roughly divisible into three or four groups.

A complete list of birds of prey within the Accipitridae family is shown below. The Accipitridae is one of the two major families within the order Accipitriformes (the diurnal birds of prey). Many well-known birds, such as hawks, eagles, kites, harriers and Old World vultures are included in this group.

Eagles are large birds of prey which are members of the bird family Accipitridae and belong to several genera which are not necessarily closely related to each other. Most of the more than 60 species occur in Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just two species can be found in the United States and Canada, nine more in Central and South America, and three in Australia. Below is listed all the members of the eagle family.