Subject: [Oversea] New discoveries about non-breeding grounds of Spoon-billed Sandpiper [Print This Page] Author: HKBWS Surveyor Time: 11/03/2008 09:56 Subject: New discoveries about non-breeding grounds of Spoon-billed Sandpiper
New discoveries about non-breeding grounds of Spoon-billed Sandpiper
News from Asia-Pacific Shorebird Network
04-3-2008
In January members of the Spoon-billed Sandpiper Recovery Team, working in two groups, discovered major non-breeding grounds of the Spoon-billed Sandpiper in the state of Arakan in the Bay of Bengal and Martaban Bay, near the border of Thailand.
A total of 84 birds were observed at two coastal wetlands in Myanmar (formerly Burma) casting new light on the non-breeding distribution of this Endangered species and confirming the international importance of these wetlands for this and other species of shorebirds. The Arakan team counted 50,000 shorebirds including Flyway significant numbers of Broad-billed Sandpipers and Mongolian Plovers as well as Pallas's (Great Black-headed) Gull.
Vice President of the Russian Bird Conservation Union, Evgeny Syroechkovskiy, stated that there was evidence that the world population of this species may have declined by as much as 50% between 2006 and 2007, making this the most significant discovery for this species for many years. The known global population of Spoon-billed Sandpiper has plunged alarmingly in the last few years and was thought to be down to only 200-300 pairs remaining.
The Spoon-billed Sandpiper Recovery Team which found the birds included staff from Biodiversity and Nature Conservation Association (BANCA): BirdLife International's Partners in Russia and Thailand, and members of ArcCona Consulting (Cambridge, UK and Kiel, Germany) and the Japan Wetlands Action Network (JAWAN).
ArcCona's analysis of satellite images, combined with the experience of previous surveys in India, Bangladesh and Thailand, and with historical records of the species in Myanmar, suggested that potentially suitable habitats existed in the south-western state of Arakan in the Bay of Bengal, and Martaban Bay near the Thai border.
"The Arakan coast has never been surveyed before, and Martaban Bay only marginally in 2003," explained Christoph Zöckler of ArcCona Cambridge
Thirty-five Spoon-billed Sandpipers were counted at one high-tide roost in Arakan, including one juvenile ringed at the breeding ground in Chukotka last summer. The team at Martaban found a total of 48 Spoon-billed Sandpiper, scattered over the huge mudflats of the bay but included a flock of 39 birds.
"Our surveys have covered only a small section of the promising Arakan coast," Christoph Zöckler added. "Although small-scale reclamation of the mudflats for prawn ponds has been observed, the coastal zones are largely healthy ecosystems, which provide both crucial habitat for tens of thousands of arctic shorebirds, and livelihoods for hundreds of thousands of people."
The Main sponsor for the survey work is Keidanren Nature Conservation Fund. Additional contributions by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (BirdLife in the UK), Asia Bird Fund of BirdLife International, the Manfred Hermsen Foundation (Bremen) and private Russian sponsors.
BirdLife's Preventing Extinctions programme aims to identify and carry out conservation actions to save all the world's most threatened (Critically Endangered) birds. BirdLife is actively seeking Species Champions to fund work for the Spoon-billed Sandpiper.
