State of India’s Bird Report

Why in news?

A large number of bird species in India are either currently declining or projected to decline in the long term, according to a report.

What is State of India’s bird report about?

• CMS COP 13 - In 2020, at the Conference of Parties to the Convention on Migratory Species joined the set of countries that regularly assess the status of their birds.
• They then launched the first report on the State of India’s Birds.
• Data - The State of India’s Birds report is a periodic assessment of the distribution range, trends in abundance, and conservation status for most of the bird species that regularly occur in India.
• IUCN data - Based on IUCN Red List of global threat status, this report places Indian species into three categories.

What are the key highlights of the 2023 report?

• Decline - India’s birds are facing a significant decline in numbers revealing a silent, gradual change in birds population.
• High Conservation priority - A large number of species that are thought to be common and widespread find themselves as of High Conservation Priority
• It means their abundance continues to decline after a considerable drop in the number over the years.
• Migratory birds - The number of long-distance migrants has declined 50%, with those that breed in the Arctic but winter in India seeing a decline of 80%.
• Overall analysis -
  1. Decline in raptors, migratory shorebirds, and ducks.
  2. Increase in Indian Peafowl and Asian Koel.

What are the major threats to birds in India?

• Increase in temperature - The average global temperature has risen by over 1 degree Celsius since pre-industrial times.
• This has resulted resulting in catastrophic consequences not only for humans but also for other living beings, like birds.
• Climate change - It affects bird reproduction and survival through the disruption of species interactions by phenological mismatches.
• It occurs when the timing of annual events like breeding, nesting and migration become out of sync.
• Mismatches in seasonal timing - It occurs between birds and their prey.
• This can reduce survival and reproduction and lead to fatal competition with other species.
• Adaptive changes - Soaring temperatures force sedentary birds to go through rapid adaptive changes.
• For instance, Amazonian birds over 50 years lost body weight to lose heat more efficiently, the report said.
• Dangerous interaction - Climate change leads to new and dangerous interactions between different species.
• Example - In Hawaii, mosquitoes have colonised higher altitudes due to rise in mercury.
• Urbanisation - As per the report, the most urbanised regions in India have the least number of bird species, the least number of rare species, and the fewest insectivorous species.
• Pollution - Cities have noise pollution, which forces birds to sing louder, or at different frequencies, or, in the worst case, to abandon otherwise suitable habitat.
• Light pollution may confuse and disorient them, causing them to collide with buildings.
• Lack of food - It occurs in urban areas which leads to the homogenisation of bird communities.
• Monoculture - It is the practice of growing one type of seed in a field at a time.
• Monocultures is known to harbour fewer bird species than natural forests within the same biome.
• Death of birds - A wide range of species are known to have been killed due to collisions with wind turbines.
• Transmission lines - It led to the death of many large-bodies species because of collision and numerous small-bodies species have been electrocuted.

References

1. Indian Express- Threats to the bird species in India
2. State of India’s Bird Report- 2023 key highlights and threats