This year's theme for World Migratory Bird Day is "Barriers to migration".In Singapore, celebrate World Migratory Bird Day at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve with art workshops and talks.
What are migratory birds? and what are the threats to them?
from the World Migratory Bird Day website
Migration is a natural process. Various kinds of birds fly over very long distances (hundreds and thousands of kilometres) to find the best habitats to feed, breed and raise their young. As low temperatures make conditions at breeding sites unfavourable, migratory birds move on.
Migratory birds are perfectly adapted to fly fast and across long distances. Nevertheless, their journey is often an exhausting one during which they go to their limits. Our wetlands and shores such as Sungei Buloh and Chek Jawa are important rest stops where migratory birds can replenish their energy and continue on their journey.
Migratory birds have to cope with a scarcity of food, stopover sites that are shrinking in area, predators, hostile weather and the expanse of seas, huge mountains and endless deserts.
Yet, humans have created additional obstacles to further complicate their journeys.
Dazzling spotlights from city skyscrapers, tall glass windows and guy wires of television towers can be invisible to birds and cause collisions that result in bird fatalities. Proliferating communication towers and masts, wind turbines, tall buildings, power lines, and fences kill or harm huge numbers of birds each year and represent increasingly fatal barriers which have a detrimental impact on entire populations of migratory birds.
Read about these threats and some possible solutions on the World Migratory Bird Day website.
More about migratory birds
- Migratory birds of Chek Jawa on wildsingapore.
- Shorebirds and waders on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog.
- More related links on the World Migratory Bird Day website.
