First comprehensive assessment of India’s birds uses eBird data
The State of India’s Birds report was launched yesterday. This is the first comprehensive assessment of the distribution range, trends in abundance, and conservation status for most of the bird species that regularly occur in India. The 10 million bird sightings that informed this milestone report came entirely from eBird. These were complemented by IUCN global Red List assessments to place species in one of three categories of conservation concern: High, Moderate or Low.
Of the 867 bird species evaluated in the report, 261 species had sufficient information to calculate population trends. Of those, 52% show long-term declines. But it’s not all bad news: Indian Peafowl, the national bird, has doubled in population over the past 25 years! Check out the summary below, and visit stateofindiasbirds.in for more information.
The State of India’s birds is a collaborative effort between ten research and conservation organizations within the country, spanning both governmental and non-governmental institutions: Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), Foundation for Ecological Security (FES), National Biodiversity Authority (NBA), National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Nature Conservation Foundation (NCF), Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON), Wetlands International South Asia (WI-SA), Wildlife Institute of India (WII) and World Wide Fund for Nature India (WWF-India).
Thank you to the 15,000 eBirders who contributed data to this report, and to all groups and people working for birds across India and around the world!