This odd-looking bird is a charismatic giant that can live up to 25 years in the wild. It has piercing eyes and and can grow up to 1.5m tall with a wingspan of 2.6m. For some, its cartoon-like charm is magnetic, for others it’s a menacing-looking predator. It is hunted for its meat and eggs and threatened by […]
Tag: migratory birds
Up to half the bird species using the African-Eurasian flyway are declining
Each year in May, World Migratory Bird Day draws attention to the billions of birds that migrate long distances with the changing of the seasons, a living braid of ecosystems separated by thousands — even tens of thousands — of kilometers. According to Kariuki Ndang’ang’a, BirdLife International Africa’s regional director, about 2 billion birds fly […]
Bald Ibis ‘the Herald of Spring’ Saved from Extinction in Turkey Thanks to Semi-Wild Breeding
Towering above the crystal clear waters of the Euphrates River, sandstone cliffs have for thousands of years played host to the bald ibis, returning from Ethiopia during the spring migration. But when modern dangers upset this delicate age-old balance, a coalition of local wildlife enthusiasts and international conservation efforts rescued this majestic bird from the […]
Giant otters, river sentinels, now listed as threatened migratory species
With evidence that the giant river otter is in an increasingly perilous state, delegates to the United Nations Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species (CMS) listed it as an animal requiring urgent conservation action at its March 2026 meeting in Campo Grande, Brazil. The giant otter (Pteronura brasiliensis), endemic to tropical river systems in South America, […]
Half of seabirds are declining. Protecting marine flyways could help save them
Animals that cross borders often encounter conservation systems that stop at them. Migratory species move through jurisdictions with little regard for political boundaries, relying on habitats spread across large distances and governed by different rules. The result is patchy protection, overlapping threats, and declining populations. Seabirds make this problem clear. They range across entire ocean […]
Scientists slam Canada-US proposal to lower trade protections for peregrine falcons
The crow-sized, slate-blue-backed peregrine falcon, with its bright yellow feet, soars across the skies from Greenland’s Arctic tundra to the steppe plains of Patagonia in South America. Falco peregrinus is one of the most widespread birds on the planet, with 19 subspecies that call coasts, mountains, deserts and river valleys home. These eye-catching raptors are […]
Avian Flu Wipes Out Nearly Half of Breeding Elephant Seals at World’s Largest Colony
The beaches of South Georgia, a remote splinter of ice and rock in the South Atlantic, should be a place of deafening, chaotic life. Normally, the shores host the planet’s largest gathering of southern elephant seals, Mirounga leonina. They are the largest seals on Earth, and they come by the tens of thousands to fight, […]
‘It’s disgusting’: Hunters, wildlife groups react to dumping of migratory birds in Sask.
The bodies of 142 migratory birds were found dumped on private land near Saskatoon earlier this month, provoking anger from hunters and wildlife groups across the province. The perpetrators haven’t been found. Conservation officers in Saskatoon released a photo of a truck they said was related to the case, which was reported on Oct. 16 […]