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The Dual Nature of Crisis
by Brian McCaffery, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Adrian Riegen, Miranda Naturalists’ Trust

Along the endless beaches and shimmering mudflats of Australia, the autumnal equinox portends a great restlessness. As days shorten, vast flocks of shorebirds feed frenetically as they prepare for a monumental journey that will take them halfway around the globe from south to north. When the very last grams of fat have been packed onto their sturdy but delicate frames, curlews and godwits, peeps and plovers, take flight in shifting skeins and ragged lines. Soon after passing New Guinea, they cross the equator and pass into spring, en route to their Arctic breeding grounds. Although there are no signs or maps, no on-ramps or interchanges, these birds are traveling one of the world’s great bird highways: the East Asian–Australasian Flyway.

Every year, nearly 5 million shorebirds of 60 species race north along the western rim of the Pacific, from New Zealand all the way to Alaska and Russia’s Chukotka Peninsula. Despite the magnitude of this spectacle, however, the birds of the East Asian–Australasian Flyway are in jeopardy. In fact, this flyway supports more species of threatened shorebirds than all the world’s other major flyways combined. Sharing wetland resources with more than one-third of humanity crowded into 24 countries, these birds face daunting threats. The vanishing wetlands of the Yellow Sea epitomize the crisis.

The bays and river deltas of this area provide indispensable refueling habitat for shorebirds journeying between the hemispheres. Two of the most endangered shorebirds in the world, the spotted greenshank and the spoon-billed sandpiper, depend on the sea’s rich estuarine mudflats, as do two of the most spectacular long-distance migrants, the great knot and the bar-tailed godwit. Their critical habitats in China, North Korea, and South Korea, however, are at risk from an all-too-familiar litany of losses. Wetlands are being reclaimed at an alarming rate, anthropogenic changes to rivers are reducing the volume of sediments available to sustain the mudflats, and the intertidal invertebrates they depend on for food are being overharvested. For the shorebirds of the Yellow Sea, a crisis is looming.

Appropriately, the Chinese ideogram for “crisis” incorporates the symbol for danger, but it also includes the character for “opportunity.” Thanks to the unstinting efforts of a dedicated international cadre of shorebird enthusiasts, there is indeed a unique opportunity for shorebird conservation along the East Asian–Australasian Flyway. Up and down the flyway, volunteer bird banders, academic biologists, nature reserve managers, government officials, and conservation organizations are teaming up to learn about and protect shorebirds and their habitats. Scores of participants from eight countries participate in a coordinated, flywaywide, color-flagging scheme to help identify the provenance and destinations of migratory shorebirds.

Bob Gill of the U.S. Geological Survey and Phil Battley with the University of Otago in New Zealand are collaborating with European colleagues to unravel the mystery of the bar-tailed godwit’s 11,000-kilometer migration from Alaska to Australia. Australian Clive Minton and Russian Mikhail Soloviev are estimating breeding success in the Arctic by assessing the proportion of juveniles in flocks on Southern Hemisphere beaches. Through the inspiration and leadership of Mark Barter and Doug Watkins, the Australian government has funded a program coordinated by Wetlands International–China in which Australian shorebird experts team up with their Chinese colleagues for training and surveys along the shores of the Yellow Sea. With additional contributions from specialists in South Korea, these surveys have discovered dozens of previously undocumented sites of international significance for shorebirds. More importantly, these collaborations have helped to develop an essential local infrastructure for shorebird conservation.

Support for these efforts has come from sources as diverse as the United Nations, the Asian Development Bank, and Wetlands International–Oceania. A crisis is looming for shorebirds in this region. There is danger, but there is also opportunity. If the creative international efforts implemented to date are any indication of what’s possible, there may still be enough time to protect many of the critical habitats so important to the migrant shorebirds of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway.

For more information, contact Brian McCaffery, Wildlife Biologist, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge, P.O. Box 346, Bethel, Alaska 99559,USA, (907) 543-3151, brian_mccaffery@fws.gov, or Adrian Riegen, Vice-chairman, Miranda Naturalists’ Trust, 231 Forest Hill Road, Waiatarua, Auckland 8 New Zealand, +64 9 232 2781, riegen@xtra.co.nz.

Refugia in Fiji’s Remote Forests
by Linda Farley, Wildlife Conservation Society

The South Pacific island nation of Fiji is home to some of the last, vast expanses of native
forest in the region. On the larger islands of Vanua Levu and Viti Levu (5,538 and 10,389 square kilometers, respectively), alien species—mainly rats and mongoose—have already impacted the native avifauna in these forests by extirpating several species of rails and seriously lowering populations of ground-doves, ducks, and ground-nesting seabirds. Rats, in particular, are thought responsible for the disappearance of the red-throated lorikeet and other small passerine species. However, within the larger, roadless, more remote forests of Vanua Levu and Viti Levu, could there be areas buffered from the impacts of these predators, islands of refugia perhaps?

We surveyed 90 sites in four of Viti Levu’s largest, remote, tropical forests for rat and mongoose activity. Data from our field studies, which examined the rate at which baits were taken at increasing distances into the forests, suggest that predator activity is heaviest near the forest edge and declines to a negligible level at 6 kilometers into the forest. So, threatened species may only be able to maintain viable populations within these remote forest refugia from predators, making these areas high conservation priorities. However, an unexpected discovery made us realize that for some bird species, a much different predator would be afoot here.

En route to identify sites for our bait study within Waimanu, one of the remote forests, we found six masked shining parrot nests. This macaw-sized parrot is loud and gregarious, and is characterized by a strange, unparrot-like, gliding flight. Kaka, as it is called locally, is still a quite common bird, yet nothing is known of its population age structure or reproductive success. The nesting requirements of this single-island endemic species is also little understood, making our observation that all six nests were in large, mature trees (having a diameter at breast height of 180 centimetres or more) an important one. Unfortunately, current logging practices in Fiji specifically target larger trees. This policy could ultimately threaten the survival of the masked shining parrot and other interior forest-dwelling birds.

In partnership with the Fiji Government, we sought and received a $400,000 U.S. Agency for International Development grant in 2002 to work towards establishing a network of conservation areas among Fiji’s remaining forests. An important part of our efforts includes studying the habitat requirements of some of the larger bird species, specifically masked shining parrots and giant forest honeyeaters. Combining the location of remote forest refugia with known habitat requirements for key bird species is helping to determine priority forests for protection. Our efforts are helping to guide forestry decisions on where to issue logging licenses to minimize impact on native birds.

To date, we have conveyed our findings to Fiji’s federal forestry, conservation, and landowner departments, as well as to the forestry industry. Together we are working to develop a biologically and economically viable, permanent, forest reserve network.

For more information, contact Linda Farley, Project Director, Fiji Forest Conservation, Wildlife Conservation Society-South Pacific Program, 11 Ma’afu Street, Suva, Fiji, (679) 331-5174, lfarley@wcs.org.

Fighting Persistent Chemicals with Persistence
by Tina Skaar, World Wildlife Fund

Over the past half century, scientists have uncovered a multitude of risks to birds posed by toxic chemicals. Akin to the canary in a coal mine, contaminated birds serve as a warning about the harmful and long-lasting effects of chemicals that are part of our everyday lives. Around the world, wildlife and people are threatened by these chemicals, which can impair reproduction, undermine immune systems, and alter sexual, neurological, and behavioral development. Entire ecosystems can be negatively affected as well. Birds at the top of the food chain, such as eagles and gulls, are especially susceptible to contamination as chemicals persist in the environment and bioaccumulate up the chain.

Brominated flame retardants (BFRs), used in furniture, building material, and clothing, are found at increasing levels in species worldwide and are a serious environmental concern. Swedish researchers found high levels of several types of BFRs in the eggs of peregrine falcons, and, perhaps not surprisingly, eggs of wild falcons contained significantly higher concentrations of the BFR “deca-BDE” than eggs of captive falcons. The fact that deca-BDE was found in eggs, however, is surprising. It demonstrates that the chemical can cross cell membranes, contrary to what scientists had thought.

Concentrations of perfluorinated compounds have been detected in cormorants in Cabras Lagoon on Italy’s island of Sardinia. The levels are similar to those found in cormorants and other fish-eating birds in the Great Lakes of North America. Perfluorinated compounds have also contaminated sea eagles in the Baltic Sea Region. The compounds, which resist heat and repel both water and oil, have been widely used since the 1950s in products like stain/water protectors, food packaging, nonstick coating, and shampoos. Perflourinated compounds are extremely persistent, with no evidence of ever fully degrading. Studies have linked a particular type, perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS), with developmental, reproductive, and immune system problems, as well as with cancer.

The results of an investigation on albatrosses nesting in a "pristine" environment on the remote Midway Islands, located between Hawaii and Japan, underscore the global nature of chemical contamination. In the 1990s, researchers reported the startling news that these long-lived seabirds in the middle of the ocean contain persistent contaminants such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane (DDT), furans, and dioxins, known to cause reproductive and other health problems in fish-eating birds of the Great Lakes. More recently, researchers have found PFOS in black-footed albatrosses on the islands, where there is no known historical use of such chemicals.

Since the 1990s, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has been calling for a global phase-out and eventual ban of toxic chemicals, especially persistent organic pollutants (POPs). In January 2004, WWF released a new report on chemicals’ effects on people and wildlife and launched its “DetoX Campaign,” urging global leaders to strengthen laws governing the use of chemicals. In May 2004, the Stockholm POPs Convention—a new treaty that will ban or severely restrict several extremely harmful chemicals—entered into force. The WWF and its partners are determined that their persistence will continue to pay off.

For more information, contact Tina Skaar, Senior Program Officer, Toxics Program, Word Wildlife Fund, 1250 24th Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20037, USA, (202) 778-9606, tina.skaar@wwfus.org, www.panda.org/detox.

Bird Conservation in India
by Zafar-ul Islam, Bombay Natural History Society

The geography of southeast Asia, with its tangled patterns of mountain chains, river drainage systems, and a long period of stable climate, seem to have been ideal for the evolution of a wide array of bird species. In India, an astounding 1,225 species of birds have been recorded. A main reason for such avian diversity is the presence of a great diversity of habitats, from the arid, cold desert of Ladakh in Sikkim, to steamy jungles of the Sunderbans, to wet, moist forests of the Western Ghats and northeastern states.

For many years, India was the major exporter of birds and bird products, with almost half of the country’s species being traded in some way. In 1991, this trade was totally prohibited, but the bird business still continues in practically every Indian city, small town, and village today.
Some 78 of those 1,225 species recorded are on the verge of extinction and are considered globally threatened. In addition to trade, habitat loss and degradation pose major threats to bird populations.

Beginning in 1998, BirdLife International expanded its Important Bird Area (IBA) programme to India. This programme aims at identifying, protecting, and managing a network of sites important for the long-term viability of bird populations throughout their geographic ranges. The Indian IBA Inventory, published in August 2004, was the first comprehensive study ever done in the country that identified sites for bird conservation using globally accepted criteria. Some 464 IBAs have been located throughout India, covering almost all globally threatened species, restricted-range species, biome assemblages, and congregatory species (mainly wetland birds). Information on the IBAs and birds therein is maintained in a database, which will be updated as new sites are established.

Within India’s IBA network, the foremost threat to bird habitats is encroachment by human settlements. With more than a billion people in the country, development pressure on land is immense. Agricultural intensification is another serious, habitat-clearing threat affecting IBAs, especially in northern India. Be it from development, agriculture, grazing, or logging, deforestation has been threatening many bird areas around the country—even the Andaman Islands. Rapidly increasing settlement there by people from mainland India is adversely affecting the islands’ birdlife, which includes 12 endemic species.

Also in 1998, the Bombay Natural History Society invited 60 Indian ornithologists to a workshop in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), at which they formed the Indian Bird Conservation Network (IBCN). Its mission is to promote conservation of birds and their habitats through the development of a national network of individuals, organisations, and the government. The IBCN’s activities include research and monitoring, conservation action, network development, awareness and education, policy and advocacy, and fundraising. The network’s 800+ members bring with them a range of expertise needed to accomplish its conservation goals. The members work together to help implement a wider conservation strategy and also provide assistance to local communities, encouraging them to combine their efforts for a greater conservation effect.

The IBCN is also establishing Site Support Groups to monitor and protect IBA sites. Several regional workshops have been held to train Forest Department personnel and other partners to do so, but more workshops are needed to fulfill the goal of establishing Site Support Groups across all of India.

More and more people are joining the IBCN to support the bird conservation movement in India. Our aim is to expand the network across South Asia and act as a bird information hub for all those working for conservation on the Indian subcontinent.

For more information, contact Zafar-ul Islam, Projects Manager, Bombay Natural History Society, Hornbill House, S.B. Singh Road, Mumbai 400 023, India, +91 22 282 1811, zafar_bnhs@rediffmail.com, www.ibcnetwork.org, www.bnhs.org.

A Deadly Mystery Solved
by Rick Watson, The Peregrine Fund

When, in 2000, biologists suggested that a new, possibly viral, infectious disease might be responsible for hundreds of thousands of vulture deaths in South Asia, we at The Peregrine Fund were requested to investigate. If disease was the cause, then it could spread to Europe and even Africa, with disastrous consequences.

We elected to work in Pakistan and Nepal, where laws permitted the collection and export of vulture samples and where we would be joined in our efforts by The Ornithological Society of Pakistan and Bird Conservation Nepal. Lindsay Oaks, a specialist in avian diseases, lead a team of experts in analyzing the samples collected. We began field studies at the largest remaining vulture colonies in each country, measuring rates and patterns of mortality.

The road since has been long, hard, hot, and dusty—much like the Punjab landscape in which we worked. We quickly found that vultures were dying in high numbers of kidney failure, called “gout” in birds. A white, paste-like deposit of uric acid coated their internal organs. More than 85 percent of the birds died of this single cause, but the question was, “Why?”

Initial samples analyzed by Oaks’ team showed no consistent signs of pathogenic viral or bacterial disease, nor were there any signs of pesticides, poisons, heavy metals, or nutritional deficiencies known to cause kidney failure. Frustrated, Oaks asked for fresher samples: “. . .they may be too autolysed to find delicate viruses. . . .” Veterinarian Martin Gilbert, biologist Munir Virani, and Pakistani partners went back to the field, worked harder and longer, often at night to escape the summer’s blistering daytime highs of 120 degrees Fahrenheit. Their task? Collect vultures as they dropped dead from their tree roosts or nests.

Despite the troubles that erupted in Pakistan following 9/11 and the war in Afghanistan, they worked on. Fresh samples were sent to the United States for testing—but still, nothing. By late 2002, Oaks’ team concluded that an infectious disease was most probably not at work. The patterns of mortality and diagnostic tests suggested acute poisoning. We began looking at chemicals and drugs used on the vultures’ primary source of food: dead domestic livestock. One drug stood out: diclofenac, known to cause kidney failure in mammals. . .and possibly birds.

Initial test results showed diclofenac present in all the birds that died of gout but in none of the others. Additional test results were consistent with the initial finding. Eureka! At last, after nearly 3 years of painstaking investigation, we had found the probable cause of death.

Since then, we have confirmed that diclofenac is present in all vultures that die of gout and is responsible for the precipitous decline of these birds in Pakistan, and probably elsewhere in South Asia. We have evidence that vultures feeding on a dead buffalo or goat previously treated with normal veterinary doses of diclofenac can easily consume a lethal amount of contaminated meat.

What now? Time is not on the vultures’ side. We have a small window of opportunity—months, not years—to prevent species extinctions by eliminating diclofenac from vultures’ food sources and through captive breeding and release. With U.S. Department of State endorsement, we called for a high-level meeting in Kathmandu, Nepal, in February 2004, where we outlined our results and sought commitments from the governments of India, Pakistan, and Nepal to control veterinary use of diclofenac and to support species restoration efforts. All agreed. Additional field work will bring answers needed to other questions: Are there places where diclofenac is not used and vultures remain safe? How big an area must be free of the drug to sustain a viable vulture population? What market forces are propelling the sale of diclofenac and what could substitute?

Species recovery can only occur when governments commit to solve the causal problem and organizations and individuals set aside their differences to work together. Having found the cause of vulture mortality, our new goals are clear.

For more information, contact Rick Watson, International Programs Director, The Peregrine Fund, World Center for Birds of Prey, 5668 W. Flying Hawk Lane, Boise, Idaho 83709-7289, USA, (208) 362-3716, rwatson@peregrinefund.org, http://peregrinefund.org/conserv_vulture.html.

Sacred Sites
by Richard Hamilton

Madagascar's Sakoantovo Forest is extraordinary. Skinny, green, tube-shaped plants covered in spines grow alongside tall trees topped with crowns of needle-like leaves. Squat baobabs with swollen trunks stand beside tangled masses of thick, thorny branches.

Venture further in, and the dry spiny forest gradually changes to riparian forest. Here, the forest looks more familiar, with tamarind trees, figs, and tall grasses. There is an incredible feeling of serenity, the stillness only broken by spellbinding birdsongs and the gentle grunting of lemurs. The local Mahafaly people have known for a long time that this forest is special. For them, it is also sacred.

“This forest is a burial site for our ancestors,” says Evoriraza, a village elder. “There is a sacred tree in the middle of the forest that cannot be touched, and also sacred animals such as tortoises, lemurs, and birds. It is taboo, or fady as we say, to hunt them.” The sacred tree is an enormous ficus, thought to be a thousand years old. Nearby are two ancient mounds of rocks and stones—tombs of the Mahafaly royal family.

Sakoantovo is also very special for the naturalist. “This area is a striking example of a forest transition zone,” says Mark Fenn of World Wildlife Fund/Madagascar. “Along the riverbed, you find riparian forest with lush vegetation, juxtaposed with succulent plants storing water in the adjacent dry spiny forest.”

The riparian forest, in particular, is extremely important to Madagascar's unique wildlife, providing food and habitat for primates, reptiles, amphibians, and birds. Here, the crested coua with its striking blue-and-purple-feathered eyes, groups of gregarious sickle-billed vangas, and long-tailed Madagascar paradise-flycatchers are found flying to and fro.

Unfortunately, Madagascar’s forests are disappearing quickly. At least 80 percent of its original forest cover has been lost, with over half of the loss occurring in the last 100 years. Sacred forests are no exception. “What was once a large sacred forest might now just be a small patch of natural vegetation around a tomb or a tree that has spirits,” notes Fenn.

Traditional practises, which in the past have helped protect wildlife and habitats, are also eroding. Southern Madagascar is one of the most economically and climatically disadvantaged parts of the world. When people need to eat, social taboos break down. The forest is already a hardware store and pharmacy for local people; it has now become their food source in times of famine as well. “Many people do illegal things, but they do so out of necessity. Cutting down trees is not something they do willingly,” says Avimary, a Mahafaly prince.

The Sakoantovo Forest is a promising example of how to begin reversing these destructive trends. Last June, the Malagasy government legally transferred the management rights to the 6,163-hectare forest to the local Mahafaly community. This transfer was not simply symbolic. It was borne of the belief that the people who best know how to look after the land are those who actually live on it.

This represents a significant departure from the previous philosophy that the way to protect forests is through creating strict protected areas. Instead, now modern forest management mechanisms embody traditional practises and beliefs. “One of our principal conservation strategies is to reinforce social and cultural traditions and norms that are favourable to the environment,” explains Fenn.

So far, the concept has been well accepted locally. “I think it’s an excellent idea,” said Avimary. “If the felling of trees continues, there will be nothing left for us except bare earth.”

But, this conservation approach is not really new to the Malagasy. They have a phrase, tontolo iainana, which means “the world about us”—a concept of man and nature living together harmoniously. This bodes well for the future of Madagascar's forests, its people, and their traditions.

For more information, contact Lee Poston, Media Coordinator, or Adam Tomasek, Senior Program Officer, World Wildlife Fund, 1250 24th Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20037, USA, (202) 293-4800, lee.poston@wwfus.org, adam.tomasek@wwfus.org, www.panda.org.