Arctic terns confirmed to have the longest animal migration in the world

Arctic TernNew information on bird migration is revealed by an international team of scientists who have confirmed that the Arctic tern flies more than 70,000 km on its annual migration trip from pole to pole — the equivalent of three trips to the moon and back over its lifetime.

Scientists from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), Greenland, Denmark, the United States and Iceland, successfully mapped the migratory movements using a tiny tracking instrument known as a geolocater. Weighing just 1.4g this highly specialised device was developed by BAS scientists specifically for tracking animal migration. Already used on other animals such as albatross, penguins and seals, they regularly record light intensity, which can be used to generate two geographical positions per day.

New warbler found in South-East Asia

Limestone Leaf-warbler has been described from the limestone karst country of Vietnam and Laos.Photo:Ulf Johansson/Swedish Museum of Natural HistoryA new species of warbler has been described from the karst limestone country of Vietnam and Laos by scientists from BirdLife International, Institute of Ecology and Biological Resources, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Swedish Museum of Natural History, and Wildlife Conservation Society.

Named Limestone Leaf-warbler Phylloscopus calciatilis, the new species is very similar to Sulphur-breasted Warbler P. ricketti, in morphology, but it is smaller with a proportionately larger bill and rounder wing. Its song and calls are diagnostic.

Kenya's Tana River Delta under siege

Photo:Michael Laplace-Toulouse/BirdLifeThe Tana River Delta in Kenya's north coast is under unprecedented threat as corporations and foreign agencies scramble to exploit its riches for export crops, biofuels and minerals. NatureKenya (BirdLife Partner) – with support of RSPB (BirdLife in UK), Schweizer Vogelschutz SVS/BirdLife Schweiz (BirdLife in Switzerland) and DOF (BirdLife in Denmark) – are working with local communities to try and stop the proposed poorly planned developments which would result in tens of thousands of people losing their livelihoods.

Soap opera in the marsh: Coots foil nest invaders, reject impostors

The American coot is a drab, seemingly unremarkable marsh bird common throughout North America. But its reproductive life is full of deception and violence.

According to biologists at the University of California, Santa Cruz, coots have evolved a remarkable set of cognitive abilities to thwart other coots that lay eggs in their neighbors' nests. In 2003, the researchers showed that coots can count their own eggs and reject ones laid in their nests by other coots. Their latest findings, published this week in Nature, show that coot parents can tell the difference between their own chicks and any impostors that manage to hatch in their nest, and they will violently reject most impostor chicks.

Partnerships strengthen migratory bird conservation in West Africa

Six countries in West Africa have committed to conserving Important Bird Areas (IBAs) for migratory birds along their coastlines. This is the outcome of a recent joint workshop organised by BirdLife and Wetlands International.

"The project offers an opportunity for coordinated monitoring and conservation of IBAs along the coast of West Africa, and for capacity building, which is crucial for migratory bird conservation, as well as enhancement of the livelihoods of local communities", said Dr Hazell Shokellu Thompson - Africa regional director of BirdLife International.

Second blow for Asian vultures

Photo:Petra Karstedt/WikimediaResearch published by the BirdLife Partnership in the journal Biology Letters has discovered a second veterinary drug causing lethal effects in Asian vultures, adding further pressure to already beleaguered vulture populations.

For every 1,000 White-rumped Vultures Gyps bengalensis occurring in southern Asia in the 1980s only one remains today because of the lethal effects of diclofenac - a drug used to treat livestock - on vultures. Alarmingly, researchers looking into safe alternatives have now identified that a second, livestock treatment in Asia - ketoprofen - is also lethal to the birds. Vultures feeding on the carcasses of recently-treated livestock suffer acute kidney failure within days of exposure.

Archaeological study of ostrich eggshell beads collected from SDG site

Ostrich eggshell (OES) beads from SDG site reflect primordial art and a kind of symbolic behaviour of modern humans. Two different manufacturing pathways are usually used in the manufacture of OES beads in Upper Palaeolithic. Pathway 1 is identified from these collections; blanks are drilled prior to being trimmed to rough discs. Based on stratigraphic data and OSL dating, these ostrich eggshell beads are probably in Early Holocene (< 10 ka BP).

Birds and climate change: indicators of a changing world

Next week, the world's governments are meeting at the United Nation's Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark to attempt to agree action to tackle climate change. The outcomes of this will have resounding consequences for biodiversity.

Climate change is already having multiple impacts on birds and their habitats, and is exacerbating many of the factors which have put one in eight of the world's birds at risk of extinction. Many species may have to shift their ranges to survive, and considerably more losers than winners are expected.

Maltese Shearwater travels to Senegal

The Corys Shearwater, which travelled an amazing 4500 km to date, fitted with a satellite transmitter shortly before leaving its nest site in Malta. Photo:Andre Raine.A young Cory's Shearwater has travelled over 4,500 km from its nest in Malta into the Atlantic Ocean and is currently off the coast of Senegal, BirdLife Malta revealed.

The seabird, which was born in Malta this year, was equipped with a satellite tag by the EU LIFE Yelkouan Shearwater project. The young bird left its nest at Hal Far on the 12th of October to begin its epic first journey and its most recent transmission puts it 138 km off the coast of Senegal.

By feeding the birds, you could change their evolutionary fate

Photo: G.Holler/WikimediaFeeding birds in winter is a most innocent human activity, but it can nonetheless have profound effects on the evolutionary future of a species, and those changes can be seen in the very near term.

That's the conclusion of a report published online on December 3rd in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, showing that what was once a single population of birds known as blackcaps has been split into two reproductively isolated groups in fewer than 30 generations, despite the fact that they continue to breed side by side in the very same forests.

Birds call to warn friends and enemies

Birds like this yellow rumped warbler sound alarm calls both to warn friends of a threat and to tell predators that they have been spotted. Photo: Susie Nishio/UC DavisBirds' alarm calls serve both to alert other birds to danger and to warn off predators. And some birds can pull a ventriloquist's trick, singing from the side of their mouths, according to a UC Davis study.

Many animals respond vocally when they detect predators, but it's not clear to whom they are signaling, said Jessica Yorzinski, a graduate student in animal behaviour at UC Davis who conducted the study with Gail Patricelli, professor of evolution and ecology. They might be warning others of the threat, but they might also be telling the predator, "I've seen you."

Some birds listen, instead of look, for mates

Photo:MDF/WikimediaLooks can be deceiving, but certain bird species have figured out that a voice can tell them most of what they need to know to find the right mate.

Andrew DeWoody, a Purdue University professor of genetics, found that the higher the pitch of a male bird's song, the more genetic diversity that bird has, making him a better mate for breeding. His study was published Wednesday (Dec. 2) in the early online edition of PLoS One.

Bulldozers advance in Paraguayan Chaco

If deforestation continues, the Paraguayan Chaco will soon be reduced to isolated fragments.Photo:Guyra ParaguayBirdLife Partner Guyra Paraguay has warned that if current rates of deforestation continue, the Chaco, currently home to rich and abundant biodiversity, could soon be reduced to the same state as South America's Atlantic Forest: isolated fragments providing a tenuous clawhold for the threatened remnants of its bird species.

Satellite images analysed by Guyra Paraguay shows that habitat losses in 2009 will be far higher than in 2008, when 228,000 ha were bulldozed to make way for agriculture, mainly cattle ranching.

ICCAT leaves albatross conservation dead in the water

Tristan Albatross are particularlly suceptible to longline fisheries as their dispersal areas overlap that of commercial fisheries.Photo:Richard Cuthbert/RSPBAfter a 3-year seabird risk assessment that found tuna and swordfish longline fishing has significant impacts on Atlantic seabird populations, the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) failed to act at a recent meeting in Recife, Brazil.

"Albatrosses and petrel populations in the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea are undergoing some of the most severe decreases anywhere in the world", said Dr Cleo Small - Senior Policy Officer for the BirdLife Global Seabird Programme, based at the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK).

Determining the gender of turkeys

Study highlights potential of new technique to determine the gender of very young birds

Six-week-old turkey poults could save millions of male chicks from being killed shortly after birth, according to Dr. Gerald Steiner from the Dresden University of Technology in Germany and his team. Their use of infrared spectroscopy to determine the gender of young birds shows that it is a fast and accurate method with the potential to be used by the breeding industry to identify and select female eggs for breeding.

'No-shooting' shorebird refuge established in Barbados

BirdLife International has created Barbados' first shorebird refuge at an abandoned shooting swamp at Woodbourne, close to the village of Packers. Woodbourne is a four hectare swamp on the flank of the St. Philip Shooting Swamps Important Bird Area (IBA), at which hunting and maintenance ceased in October 2004. Two former hunters were instrumental in securing the lease and financing the initial restoration of Woodbourne Shorebird Refuge. Restoration work started in May and the swamp was ready for the 2009 southbound, autumn migration.

Europe's red kites in peril

Red Kite, at Paradisio, Brugelette, Belgium. Photo: Hans HillewaertPoisoning has led to huge declines in Europe's red kite population.

Numbers on the bird's main wintering grounds have halved since 1994 and there have been big falls in the number of breeding pairs in its heartlands of Spain, France and Germany. So alarming is the drop in numbers that the EU has now adopted a Red Kite Action Plan, produced by the RSPB on behalf of Birdlife International and with the support of red kite experts across Europe.

UK Minister stands up for seabirds

Photo:L.Guerin/WikimediaWe must act now to prevent the world's seabirds from sliding towards extinction, that's the message that Huw Irranca-Davies, the UK's Fisheries Minister, will deliver to his European counterparts at the November Fisheries Council meeting.

The minister will remind colleagues at the Brussels meeting that European fisheries, both in EU waters and on the high seas beyond the EU's shores, take a massive toll of seabirds through falling foul of a variety of fishing gears. Every year in European waters alone, an estimated 200,000 seabirds are snared, entangled and drowned on longline hooks and in trawls and gill-nets.

Saving Darwin's mockingbird

Photo:Royal SocietyA very rare mockingbird could be reintroduced to the Galapgos Islands thanks to specimans collected by Charles Darwin, it is reported in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters .

A team of geneticists have extracted DNA from birds that Darwin collected while visiting the islands in 1835. Darwin noticed the Floreana mockingbird's evident difference from the specimens he collected on other islands. Thus, the former holds a special claim on being a first vital clue for Darwin's theory of speciation under natural selection.

New study sheds light on nightjar

Photo:Michael J. Morel/BirdLifeA new study of the critically endangered Puerto Rican Nightjar Caprimulgus noctitherus suggests that the species' geographic range is greater than previously estimated. This is the major finding of Geographic distribution of the Puerto Rican Nightjar: A patch occupancy approach, a joint effort between the Sociedad Ornitológica Puertorriqueña, Inc. (SOPI, the BirdLife Partner and Species Guardian for Puerto Rican Nightjar), Mississippi State University, USGS Cooperative Research Units, BirdLife International, and The British Birdwatching Fair.