Rare sociable lapwings discovery in Uzbekistan

This is a video from Sweden about a sociable lapwing (and turnstones and other birds).

From BirdLife:

Record Sociable Lapwing flock found in Uzbekistan

Mon, Oct 22, 2012

One of the most recent conservation organisations to become a range state partner supporting international Sociable Lapwing conservation is BirdLife’s Partner UzSPB – the Uzbekistan Society for the Protection of Birds. During their first surveys for the species, this autumn, they made a remarkable discovery – more than 400 Sociable Lapwings present at the Talimarzhan Reservoir, in Kashkadarya Province, during their migration south.

The significance of this discovery is considerable – not only is it an important national record but also internationally – as the number of individuals in this migrating flock greatly exceeds the total number of birds we have recorded wintering in India and Pakistan in recent years.

UzSPB are one of several new national range state partners that have recently joined our international effort to help recovery of Sociable Lapwing and their involvement and surveys this year have been made possible by support provided to advance the scope of the international project by BirdLife Species Champion – Swarovski Optik.

The surveys, conducted by a team of five from UzSPB, were led by Dr. Mukhtor Turaev and took place in the Karshinskaja steppe around Lake Talimarzhan, at Lake Ayakagitma in the Kyzyl Kum desert and at the Ecocenter Jeyran and the Tudakul reservoir in the Karnabchul steppe.

A total of 29 birds were encountered in three groups during visits to Lake Talimarzhan on September 4th to 8th and then the big flock there was discovered present from September 16th to 20th.

During the team’s third survey from September 26th to 30th the big flock had left to continue its migration but a further seven Sociable Lapwings were still present in the area – two birds on a water basin near the town of Talimarzhan and five more at the Tudakul reservoir in the Karnabchul steppe.