Kashmir gets equipped in monitoring birds to maintain a census

A workshop organised to train experts in monitoring birds population and understanding their migration patterns came to an end in Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.

Srinagar, Sept 26 : A workshop organised to train experts in monitoring bird's population and understanding their migration patterns came to an end in Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.

The three-day workshop aimed at training its ornithologists and bird lovers in modern techniques that would help keep a check on the number of birds coming into the state, and will also enable researchers to keep a track of bird casualties.

It was organised by the state's Department of Wildlife in collaboration with the Bombay (Mumbai) Natural History Society in Srinagar.

"Both birds and aircraft use the same path. We need to segregate them and in order to segregate them, we should know they are going. So, for all these reasons we need bird ringing and also bird monitoring," said Asad Reehmani, Director of Bombay (Mumbai) natural history society.

He added that this could not be done by an individual or an organisation, but has to be done on a large-scale.

The state wildlife authority, which conducts the annual bird census, believes the workshop will make their study more scientific.

"In Jammu and Kashmir, we receive about 358 varieties of birds and about 28 (varieties) in Kashmir alone. We receive six lakh migratory birds annually. Our staff conducts census but we want it to be scientific," said A.K. Srivastava, chief wildlife warden in the state.

The annual migration of rare and exotic birds from the high altitudes of Siberia, Afghanistan, China, Central Asia and Northern Europe begins around September, with most birds nestling in the Kashmir Valley till March every year.

ANI