Wars and WildLife

Guest blog by Richard Porter

Amidst the strife and turmoil that we hear about daily in the Middle East, there are always glimmers of hope. The fate of wildlife is often forgotten amongst the horrors of war and the dreadful human tragedies, but the latest BirdLife Magazine shows there are inspiring stories.

https://extranet.birdlife.org

OSME supporting membership scheme

The conservation work that OSME can support across the Middle East, The Caucasus and Central Asia is heavily reliant on the number of members that support us. The majority of funds raised from membership subscriptions is spent on the publication of our well-respected journal Sandgrouse and our Conservation & Research Fund.

Batumi – “this one is very rare, it’s on the red-list”

I recently blogged about how amazing Batumi can be for migrating raptors – The Serengeti of the Skies. Unfortunately, there is a less amazing side to Batumi, and it involves the illegal killing of birds. In 2015, OSME were pleased to support a project by the Batumi Raptor Count that aimed to assess the species (mainly raptors) and the numbers being killed. More than 200 individuals were observed being killed from the monitoring point at Sakhalvasho, and during standardised body counts, the remains of 445 were located.

Migration study shows importance of IBAs

Guest blog by Majd Abu Zaghlan

A new study has shown that Important Bird Areas (IBAs) in the Arabian Peninsula are vital for the successful migration of warblers that depend on wetlands. The study examined Great Reed Warbler migration routes using Geolocator tracking devices.

https://americanornithologypubsblog.org/. . ./
Information was collected on the migratory patterns

Batumi – Serengeti of the skies

Batumi in Georgia is rapidly becoming one of the best known places in the world to watch one of nature’s most spectacular phenomenon – migration. Specifically, raptor migration. Every autumn for the last 9 years a group of dedicated volunteers have been recording the incredible numbers of raptors migrating through the Batumi bottleneck. And the numbers can be staggering, more than a million birds of prey were counted in 2012, single day counts regularly exceed 50,000 individuals