A EUROPE-WIDE bird watching project has been a great success, with over 50,000 observations recorded across the bloc.
Some of the first sightings of swallows and swifts were made in Cyprus as early as January 11. Schoolchildren from Oroklini joined in with others Europe-wide to learn about the project.
The Spring Alive 2008 online campaign, organised by BirdLife International, finished on June 22. Since February, children from 30 European countries have watched the arrival of four popular migratory species, and entered their observations on the project website.
Spring Alive is a pan-European project designed to promote children’s interest in nature and its conservation through the arrival of spring.
The core component of Spring Alive is a mass-participation web-based project that is implemented in most European countries including Cyprus. Everybody was encouraged to observe and record the arrival of migratory bird species.
BirdLife Cyprus, the local BirdLife International representative, coordinated the project on the island. Amongst the activities arranged was an event at Oroklini Marsh, Larnaca, attended by the children of the local elementary school. In addition to being informed about Spring Alive they spent the morning being shown the birds that use this Important Bird Area by BirdLife Cyprus staff.
Campaign participants observed the arrivals of White Stork Ciconia ciconia, Common Cuckoo Cuculus canorus, Common Swift Apus apus and Barn Swallow Hirundo rustica back to Europe. The first arrivals were again very early.
Nevertheless, Spring Alive data showed that the average arrival date was several days later than previous years.
One of the goals is to track the changes in arrival dates over many years. With the help of European children, BirdLife International is increasing understanding of climate change and migratory birds.
“Observing the weather conditions during one year is one argument in the discussion about the arrival of migratory birds to Europe, but climate changes over many years are much more interesting to witness. Thanks to Spring Alive we can see how these things are connected and how they influence birds” commented Joanna Kalinowska, Spring Alive European co-ordinator.
Overall, the European BirdLife Partners managed to encourage around 25,000 Europeans to share the beauty and fascination of bird migration. The country with the most observations was Italy with over 12,000 sightings from events and school programmes. This was closely followed by observations from children in Ireland, Poland, Russia and Belarus.
Visit the project’s website to learn more about the Spring Alive Campaign at www.springalive.net
