Following the nocturnal bird migration study conducted in partnership with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, Peking University and the Beijing Municipal Government, we have built up a store of tens of thousands of calls. To help support anyone wanting to study nocturnal migration in Beijing or indeed anywhere in north and east China, we have put together what we are calling a “Beijing Nocturnal Flight Call Library”.
The library, including most of the species we have recorded, can be found here. It is also available via the drop down menu under “Nocturnal Bird Migration in Beijing” in the menu bar.
The page provides examples of nocturnal flight calls (NFCs), including spectograms and audio files, all of which have been recorded in Beijing. Dates and recording location are given for each file.
Nocturnal recording is in its infancy in Beijing, so it is possible some of the identifications are incorrect. If you believe a call is incorrectly identified, please contact Wild Beijing via the contact form on the “Welcome to Wild Beijing” page. Thank you.
Some of the calls are of poor quality and will be replaced by better quality recordings as and when available.
Information provided about some of the species has been drawn from the following excellent websites from Europe:
My heartfelt gratitude goes to colleagues at Peking University, including Professor Hua Fangyuan, Liu Shuangqi and Ren Xiaotong for their help and support.
Since autumn 2021, in partnership with Peking University and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, Wild Beijing has been involved in a study of nocturnal migration from the roof of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in Beijing.
A summary of the findings over four full seasons (autumn 2021, spring 2022, autumn 2022 and spring 2023) has now been published in Bird Conservation International. The article is Open Access and can be viewed or downloaded here.
An extract from the abstract reads:
“From around 3,350 hours of recording effort, we manually extracted and identified 84,135 nocturnal flight calls (NFCs), involving at least 111 species or species groups that are associated with a wide range of habitat types. To our knowledge, this study is the first formal investigation of bird migration using NFC monitoring in the EAAF, serving as a proof-of-concept case for wider, long-term monitoring efforts in this traditionally understudied region. Our findings also highlight the significance of incorporating migratory bird conservation into urban planning and land management practices.”
The study, which is ongoing, has helped to raise awareness of the scale of bird migration over China’s capital city as its residents sleep at night and, in particular, demonstrates that if Beijing is to fulfil its responsibility to migratory birds – to facilitate safe passage – it must incorporate the diverse habitat requirements of migratory birds into urban planning, including the design and management of green spaces.
Mortality of migratory birds in major cities is high. In the United States it is estimated that up to a billion birds are killed every year through bird collisions with buildings, caused by a combination of light pollution and reflective glass, with the risk being particularly acute around the first few floors of a building.
Fortunately, through tackling light pollution and adjusting building regulations to require buildings to be ‘bird-safe’, there is much that cities can do to mitigate this risk and, through appropriate habitat management, to support safe passage of migratory birds.
For cities on a major migratory flyway, integrating the needs of migratory birds into urban planning should be a key pillar of becoming a ‘sustainable city’.
Work is underway in China through the “Anti-Bird Collision Action Alliance”, a network of volunteers and academics coordinated by Duke Kunshan University, to gather data about the scale of the risk of bird collisions in China and to promote solutions. Already, several major buildings – for example the headquarters of TenCent (Asia’s largest tech company) in Shenzhen – has been retrofitted with bird-safe measures and major real-estate companies, such as Vanke, are planning pilots to trial bird-safe glass.
The Beijing Municipal Government Forest and Parks Bureau, a partner in the nocturnal migration project, manages more than 70% of Beijing’s land and, at a special seminar at AIIB to present the findings, committed to integrate the findings of this study into land management guidelines.
A huge thanks to partners and colleagues at Peking University, including Hua Fangyuan and Liu Shuangqi, and at Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Andrew Fransworth and Benjamin Van Doren. We also owe a special thanks to Sir Danny Alexander, Vice President of AIIB, and his team, especially Alberto Ninio, Zeyu Li, Yaying Du, and Bo Yan, for all their support to the project and to all the birders and wildlife recordists who have helped with call identifications, including Jonas Buddemeier, Geoff Carey, David Darrell-Lambert, James Eaton, Paul Holt, Juefei Li, James Lidster, Magnus Robb, Seán Ronayne, Joost van Bruggen, and Stanislas Wroza. Finally, we would like to thank the Beijing Municipal Government Forest and Parks Bureau for their terrific support and positive engagement.
As we head into a new year, it’s traditionally a good time to reflect on the previous 12 months. After three difficult years of pandemic restrictions, 2023 was a welcome return to at least some kind of normality in China, with the borders opening up and physical meetings again being possible. I have been incredibly fortunate to be involved in some exciting and innovative projects and to work with some of the best people I’ve ever met. I haven’t been very efficient at updating the blog part of the website this year, so here are a few selected highlights from 2023.
First, the nocturnal bird migration study in partnership with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and Peking University. Spring 2023 was the fourth consecutive season of recording nocturnal bird sounds from the rooftop of AIIB’s headquarters in Beijing. In total, we recorded more than 83,000 calls from at least 111 species, all from just one building.
Spectograms of the some of the species recorded at night from the roof of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
A draft scientific paper, led by Peking University, has been submitted to a journal for consideration and, in late November, Liu Shuangqi presented the results to the British Ornithologists’ Union (BOU) conference. This is the first study of its kind in East Asia and, as well as helping to raise public awareness of the ‘invisible miracle’ that happens over our heads as Beijing’s residents sleep at night (thanks to media articles in China and even in The Economist), it has demonstrated the diversity of birds passing over the capital and, importantly, the diversity of their habitat requirements. It was instructive that the top three species recorded by volume were Olive-backed Pipit Anthus hodgsoni 树鹨 Shù liù (woodland species), Eurasian Skylark Alauda arvensis 云雀 Yúnquè (grassland species) and Black-crowned Night Heron Nycticorax nycticorax 夜鹭 Yè lù (wetland species). This illustrates that if Beijing is to fulfil its role in the flyway – to secure safe passage of migratory birds – it must provide a balance of natural habitats to help these extraordinary travellers to cross what is, to them, a hostile urban environment. Encouragingly, at the summer 2022 workshop in AIIB to present the initial results, the Beijing municipal government recognised the value of scrub and grassland habitats (until recently classified as ‘waste land’) and committed to integrate the findings of the nocturnal migration project into the way they manage green spaces in Beijing. Given that the Beijing Municipal Forest and Parks Bureau manages 71% of Beijing’s land, that is a big step. The last few decades have seen a heavy emphasis on tree-planting in the capital, often at the expense of scrub and grassland, driven by the use of ‘tree-cover’ as the overriding measure of the quality of the environment. In most cases, when trees are planted, it has usually involved single species monocultures, all the same age and in straight lines, with undergrowth and fallen leaves removed to keep the trees ‘tidy’, resulting in very little biodiversity. We very much hope that this is a turning point towards a more balanced and qualitative approach to habitat management. It’s going to take time to see significant change but, as the capital city of the country that presided over agreement by more than 190 countries on the new Global Biodiversity Framework under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, it would be fitting if Beijing led the way towards aligning the city with biodiversity goals by integrating the needs of migratory birds into urban planning.
We are planning to continue monitoring nocturnal bird migration from AIIB’s roof and have received tremendous support from Cornell Lab (Andrew Farnsworth and Benjamin van Doren) to help with automated detections and identifications, which will make processing the recordings more efficient (thus far, all processing has been done manually). Once we have the automated processing working effectively, we plan to explore the potential for schools to deploy recorders on their campuses as a way to expand the monitoring of migratory birds.. and potentially even set up competitions, for example to see which school records the most Olive-backed Pipits in a season. Huge thanks go to my partners at Peking University, especially Professor Hua Fangyuan and Liu Shuangqi, to AIIB staff for their invaluable support, especially Sir Danny Alexander, Alberto Ninio, Tian Hua, Yan Bo and Li Zeyu, and to the Beijing Municipal government, especially Wang Xiaoping, for the wonderful cooperation and positive response to the findings.
Second, the Ambassadors for Nature initiative has gone from strength to strength. Launched in July 2022 by Clare Fearnley, the former New Zealand Ambassador to China, with 14 founding members, as of 31 December there are 35 ambassadors signed up to support the “pledge for nature”, committing to manage their diplomatic green spaces in a more friendly way for nature. Events this year have been hosted by the Irish, Swiss, Belgian and Slovenian Ambassadors focusing on migratory birds, pollinators and guidance for embassy gardeners, with a field trip to Miyun Reservoir hosted by the Beijing Municipal government.
The Ambassadors for Nature group at the Qingshui River, Miyun District, May 2023.
In addition to encouraging actions – such as planting native pollinator-friendly species, keeping areas wild, reducing and eliminating the use of pesticides, monitoring wildlife and erecting insect hotels, bird and bat boxes to support biodiversity in diplomatic green spaces – the initiative has been a great way to get biodiversity onto the agenda of senior foreign policy officials and to promote international cooperation. For example, thanks to Bruno Angelet, the new Belgian Ambassador, there are plans for a new international cooperation project to study the Beijing Swift involving Chinese, European (Belgian, UK and Swedish) and African (Namibian) scientists, with political support from the Beijing Municipal government and the relevant embassies. And it was thanks to this network of ambassadors that I was honoured to go birding with US Ambassador Nicholas Burns and his wife, Libby, to Shahe Reservoir in Beijing. Following that, Ambassador Burns invited me to a reception at his residence in honour of visiting California governor, Gavin Newsom. I briefed Governor Newsom on the incredible story of one particular migratory bird that connects China and the US (Alaska) – the Bar-tailed Godwit – and discussed the potential for a three-way ‘(Inter)National Park’ involving New Zealand, Yellow Sea of China and Alaska to celebrate this incredible bird as a way of celebrating biodiversity and building bridges. I believe Gavin has high political ambitions, so maybe it planted a seed!
California Governor Gavin Newsom at a reception at the US Embassy in Beijing at the end of his visit to China in October 2023.
The Ambassadors for Nature initiative has also provided opportunities to engage on biodiversity with visiting ministers from a range of participating countries, including the New Zealand Foreign Minister and the Canadian Environment Minister.
With the visiting Canadian Environment Minister, Steven Guilbeault, at Shahe Reservoir
In addition, building on the success of the Ambassadors for Nature initiative in Beijing, I understand that the New Zealand ministry of foreign affairs is considering the idea of encouraging ALL of its embassies overseas commit to the ‘pledge for nature‘. And the UN Development Programme (UNDP) in the Republic of Korea is planning to begin a similar initiative with foreign embassies in Seoul.
At the same time, several schools have adopted the ‘pledge for nature‘ and are applying it to their campuses. It has been wonderful to work with students and teachers, including at the Western Academy of Beijing (WAB), where different groups of students have led on implementing each aspect of the pledge. Helping nature is infectious!
This group of students at the Western Academy of Beijing has taken responsibility for identifying a suitable area to leave wild and to monitor changes in the wildlife, especially insects, for comparison with the remainder of the campus.
Third, I’ve been part of a small group pushing for the control of the sale of mist nets. Despite strengthened wildlife protection laws, improved law enforcement and greater public awareness, mist nets remain one of the biggest killers of migratory birds in China (and SE Asia). Even in Beijing, poachers still operate. In the capital, these criminals target mainly Siberian Rubythroat and Bluethroat for the cagebird trade but data from prosecutors show that mist nets have been used in many large-scale trapping efforts, both for the cagebird trade and for exotic food, all across China. Twice this year I have personally encountered poachers using nets to trap migratory birds in Shunyi District. The map below, produced by Gu Xuan, shows the locations where poachers have been apprehended in Beijing in 2023 alone.
A map showing the locations where poachers have been caught in Beijing in 2023 (Gu Xuan).
The good news is that there is determination to tackle this illegal activity and there is a lot going on behind the scenes that I hope to be able to talk about in a future post. Needless to say, action is starting and, today, if you search for mist nets on e-commerce platforms, a warning appears that it is illegal to capture wild birds, and this is just the start.
At the same time, it is likely that the UN Convention on Migratory Species will promote tackling the illegal killing of birds, including with nets, at its next meeting in February 2024, so I am optimistic that further progress will be made this year both in China and internationally.
Fourth, over the last few years it has been the privilege of my life to work with ShanShui Conservation Center to help set up the “Valley of the Cats” project in Qinghai Province on the Tibetan Plateau. This is the community-based conservation and wildlife-tourism project, working with a village of Tibetan yak herder families. The herder families host visitors in their homes and guide them to look for the special wildlife they have in the area, including snow leopard, wolf, lynx etc. Many visitors remark on what a privilege it is to experience authentic Tibetan hospitality, as well as having the opportunity to see the elusive snow leopard. At the end of 2023, the project is close to passing the milestone of 4 million RMB (GBP 440,000) of revenue, 100% of which has stayed in the community. The project was showcased at the 2nd National Parks forum in Xining in August 2023 as an example of sustainable tourism and a way to bring income into local communities to reward them for their stewardship of important and fragile landscapes, and has won a host of national awards. In late August 2023, following the National Parks Forum, with ShanShui Conservation Center I visited two other (spectacular) villages that are interested in setting up similar initiatives.
A glacier at 5,000m asl near Diqing, Qinghai Province
One of the spectacular valleys in Diqing at 4,900m asl.
There is no doubt that the Valley of the Cats model, focusing on low volume and community-led tourism, can help to bring income to relatively poor communities while protecting fragile ecosystems. However, it is not a model that will work everywhere. In my view, three conditions are required for success: first, the presence of sought after wildlife (to create demand); second, a robust and established community structure that is able to handle decision-making and deal authoritatively with any issues that arise; and third, a supportive local government (essential in China). It will take time to establish similar projects in other villages but the high interest from other communities reflects the potential of this approach to engage and support communities inside China’s national parks. ShanShui Conservation Center, powered by a terrific group of enthusiastic and dedicated young people, is doing brilliant work and I cannot praise them enough for the contribution this NGO is making to conservation in China.
It was during the September visit to Qinghai that we were fortunate to enjoy a stunning encounter with a female snow leopard next to the track.. Alerted by the alarm calls of several marmots as we were driving, we stopped to check whether there was a predator in the vicinity. Looking at the directions faced by the calling marmots, and triangulating their lines of sight, we were able to spot the big cat as she stalked one of the rodents. When just a few metres away, she made a dash but the marmot disappeared down its burrow in a cloud of dust in the nick of time. The video below (low resolution for ease of uploading) was taken just after the failed hunt using my iPhone attached to my Swarovski ATX95 scope.
Watching a snow leopard from the track in the Valley of the Cats, August 2023
Special thanks to Shi Xiangying, Zhao Xiang, Yuqiu (Iris), Jun Yi (Audrey) and Qiuni for their hard work and for a wonderful trip in August.
Fifth, after my brush with TV in 2019 when I enjoyed the incredible experience of filming with Ray Mears as part of his Wild China series, I seem to have somehow become a (somewhat reluctant!) TV presenter in China. In April I spent a week at Tiaozini, Dongtan, Jiangsu Province, with CCTV4 making a documentary to highlight the importance of coastal wetlands and migratory birds. Tiaozini is at the heart of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway and is a vital stopover for millions of migratory shorebirds – natural heritage that is shared by 22 countries from New Zealand in the south to Arctic Russia and Alaska in the north. The programme aired in June on prime time TV. And September saw the launch of National Geographic/CICC’s “Road to Carbon Neutrality”, a two-part documentary series. The two episodes, hosted by China-based photojournalist Sean Gallagher and me respectively, focus on nationwide efforts to reduce China’s carbon emissions in order to meet the twin goals of peaking emissions by 2030 and achieving net zero by 2060. Filmed in 2022, navigating all manner of pandemic-related restrictions, the documentary has been shown in more than 50 countries worldwide. And in November I appeared in an episode of UK explorer, Ash Dykes’ series “The Great Wall with Ash Dykes”, speaking with Ash about the wildlife of the Great Wall around Beijing. Later that month I was invited to the studio of CCTV’s international channel, CGTN, to film a talk on the importance of biodiversity and what people can do to help. That aired in early December. It is encouraging to see the growing media interest in biodiversity in China and, although I am not a natural in front of the camera, I am happy to do anything that will help to advance the interests of nature.
Filming in Tiaozini about the importance of coastal wetlands and migratory birds, April 2023
Finally, at the end of the year, I was able to spend Christmas with my family in Norfolk for the first time since 2019. It was a wonderful chance to spend time with my elderly parents and to catch up on some of the incredible wildlife experiences in north Norfolk, especially the spectacular flights of Pink-footed Geese at Holkham.
This year, I was keen to record the awesome sound of the geese and the 22-min soundscape below starts with the wakening of the local Eurasian Wrens and Blackbirds before the Pink-footed Geese begin to lift, passing over in groups, their calls slowly growing in intensity. At 07m50s the local Jackdaws leave their roost and, towards the end, the calls and song of Goldfinches tinkle as the last of the geese leave the roost. Best enjoyed with headphones! Thanks to Holkham Nature Reserve manager, Jake Fiennes, for tips on where best to record the geese.
As if that experience wasn’t incredible enough, for a few days before Christmas, rare nacreous (“mother of pearl”) clouds were visible, providing a stunning backdrop as the geese returned to their roost at dusk…
Pink-footed Geese returning to Holkham National Nature Reserve just after sunset against a backdrop of nacreous ‘mother of pearl’ clouds.
A lone Eurasian Curlew going to roost at dusk as nacreous clouds light up the evening sky.
It was a fitting end to 2023, a reminder of the breathtaking beauty of nature and why I do what I do.
As we begin 2024, I would like to acknowledge the brilliant, and growing, group of conservationists in China who are doing wonderful work to celebrate and protect the special wildlife we have all around us, and the places it needs. It is an ongoing privilege to support what you do!
Finally finally, some of you may have noticed that Birding Beijing has evolved into Wild Beijing. This reflects the broadening interest and coverage of the website. As well as the branding, the web address has also changed from birdingbeijing.com to wildbeijing.org. There will be an automatic redirect for a few months but, in due course, only wildbeijing.org will be accessible, so please update any bookmarks. Subscriptions for alerts about new posts have been automatically transferred to the new site.
Wishing everyone a happy, healthy and nature-filled 2024!
Watercolour of an (Amur) Leopard Cat (Prionailurus bengalensis, 豹猫, Bàomāo), January 2024. This small cat (around 50% bigger than the average house cat) is native to Beijing and can be found in the mountains and in some wetlands where there is lots of cover. As an ambush hunter it needs scrub and grassland, both habitats that have decreased significantly in lowland Beijing due to development and tree-planting. Primarily nocturnal, sightings during daylight hours are rare. This small painting is in celebration of an incredible sighting in Tongzhou District in December 2023. More details here.
Title image: a Beijing Swift (Apus apus pekinensis 北京雨燕 Běijīng yǔyàn) flying through a rainbow, Wenyu River, June 2023.
On Tuesday 27 September 2022, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) hosted a special seminar to publicise the results of the pilot Beijing Nocturnal Bird Migration Project.
Hosted by AIIB’s Vice President for Policy and Strategy, Sir Danny Alexander, and moderated by Tian Hua, the seminar included speakers from Peking University, the Beijing Municipal Government, Cornell Lab of Ornithology and embassies along the flyway, including Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia. It was a wonderful opportunity to raise awareness of the miracle of bird migration that happens over Beijing as its residents sleep at night.
AIIB’s Vice President for Policy and Operations, Sir Danny Alexander, opened the seminar.AIIB’s Tian Hua was the moderator for the morning.Dr Wang Xiaoping from Beijing’s Forest and Parks Bureau said Beijing was moving towards an ‘ecosystem approach’ to land management, recognising the value of wetlands, grassland and scrubland as well as trees.
Every spring and autumn millions of birds fly over China’s capital city between breeding grounds in Siberia, Mongolia and north China and non-breeding grounds in south China, S & SE Asia, Australasia and even, in the case of Beijing’s Swifts and Common Cuckoos, to Africa. Some of these birds migrate during the day – for example, the larger soaring birds, such as birds of prey, cranes, storks etc that rely on thermals to assist their flight. However, the majority of birds (around 80%) – especially the smaller species – migrate at night. This is because there are fewer predators active during the dark hours, the weather tends to be cooler and more stable and some birds navigate using the night sky.
Many of these birds vocalise as they migrate – to keep in touch with each other as they fly and, towards the end of the night, attempting to initiate responses from their own kind on the ground, which could indicate a safe place to stop for the day. Using a simple sound recorder, it’s possible to gain an insight into the volume and diversity of birds flying over at night.
In autumn 2021, Birding Beijing, in collaboration with AIIB and Peking University, began a pilot project to record bird sounds at night from the roof of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. AIIB’s building is ideal – it’s 15 storeys high, not close to any major roads, free from aircraft noise and close to one of Beijing’s largest urban green spaces, the Olympic Forest Park. During the period 25 August to 2 November 2021 we programmed the recorder to record every night from sunset to sunrise, resulting in over 700 hours of recordings.
The digital sound recorder from Wildlife Acoustics fixed to the roof of AIIB’s headquarters in Beijing, close to the Olympic Forest Park.
Key findings:
34,713 bird calls recorded
Around 95% of calls identified to species or, in the case of buntings, flycatchers and thrushes, to family, with more than 60 species identified so far
Most common calls were Olive-backed Pipit (12,411), Black-crowned Night Heron (5,358) and Eurasian Skylark (2,611).
Five nights recorded over 2,000 calls (in order of volume`)
27/28 September (2,703 calls)
28/29 September (2,405 calls)
14/15 October (2,270 calls)
9/10 September (2,233 calls)
22/23 September (2,025 calls)
The busiest hour-long file was 0502-0602 on 29 September with 1,012 calls
Rarities included possibly only Beijing’s 8thGrey-tailed TattlerTringa brevipes 灰尾漂鹬 Huī wěi (piào) yù and at least two Little CurlewNumenius minutus 小杓鹬 Xiǎo biāo yù (not annually recorded in Beijing).
The graph below shows the volume of bird calls recorded by date.
More detail about the results, including the species recorded, volume per species and date ranges, as well as example calls, can be found here.
Terry briefed the seminar on the key findings of the Autumn 2021 pilot nocturnal bird migration project.
Liu Shuangqi from Peking University briefed how the project is now expanding to six recording locations across the city in spring 2022 covering areas with varying light pollution to gain a insight into whether artificial light affects the calling rate of migratory birds.
Liu Shuangqi of Peking University spoke about the impact of artificial light on migratory birds and how the project is expanding to cover more recording sites.
Assistant Professor Hua Fangyuan provided some important context about the loss of 3 billion birds in North America since 1970, something scientists can estimate with some confidence given the strong datasets in the continent (13 datasets were used for the North American study, some of which stretch back more than 50 years). Those data are lacking in East Asia – in particular for migratory land birds – but what we do know, for example about shorebirds, is that bird populations here are likely to be on a similar trend. Long-term, standardised, monitoring is key.
Assistant Professor Hua Fangyuan provided important context about the decline or birds in N America and the lack of data in East Asia, emphasising the value of continuing the nocturnal migration project.
So, what do the results of Beijing’s pilot project tell us?
First, that there is a high volume and diversity of birds migrating over Beijing, confirming that it is on a major ‘flyway’ or expressway for birds.
Second, that most of these migratory birds are species that pass through several countries, reinforcing that migratory birds do not belong to any single country – they are shared natural heritage and, with that, comes a shared responsibility to protect them and the places they need.
And third, if Beijing is to fulfil its responsibility to the flyway – to facilitate safe passage, the city must manage urban spaces in a way that helps birds to cross the hostile urban environment. Given the diversity of species migrating over Beijing (the top three by volume are a woodland bird, a wetland bird and a grassland bird), that means providing a diversity of habitats including natural forest, wetland and grassland.
After interventions from Peking University’s Professor Lu Zhi, embassies from flyway countries, a video message from Dr. Andrew Farnsworth of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and a lively Q&A with AIIB staff and invited guests, the event was wrapped up by AIIB’s General Counsel, Alberto Ninio, and culminated in the signing of a ‘letter of intent’ between AIIB and the Beijing Municipal Government.
Peking University’s Professor Lu Zhi, China’s most well-known conservationist, delivered some wonderful and inspiring remarks to the audience.Cornell’s Dr. Andrew Farnsworth recorded an inspirational video message about the North American experience, providing food for thought for the Q&A session.Svar Barrington from the New Zealand Embassy in Beijing gave a perspective from the southern end of the flyway and spoke eloquently about how biodiversity, in particular migratory birds, was now high up New Zealand’s list of foreign policy priorities.The audience was captivated by the sound of a flock of Bean Geese (Anser serrirostris 短嘴豆雁 Duǎn zuǐ dòu yàn) that flew over the AIIB building at 0354hrs on 16 March 2022.AIIB’s General Counsel and environmental lawyer, Alberto Ninio, closed the seminar ahead of the signing of the letter of intent.
AIIB and the Beijing Municipal Government agreed to cooperate on the nocturnal migration project and biodiversity conservation more broadly, including a commitment to use the data about the diversity and volume of migratory birds flying over China’s capital to inform land management policies in Beijing. This would ensure they help the city fulfil its role in the flyway – to facilitate safe passage of these migratory birds that are shared by so many countries.
AIIB and the Beijing Municipal Government signing the letter of intent at the end of the seminar.
After having trawled through 700 hours of recordings, to see the energy and commitment of the participants at this special seminar made it all worthwhile!
I was struck by the openness and willingness of the Beijing Municipal Government to take into account the data from this project in their land management policies. This is a big deal when one considers that the Beijing Forest and Parks Bureau manages around 75% of the capital’s landmass.
Huge thanks to AIIB, in particular Sir Danny Alexander, Alberto Ninio, Erik Berglof, Tian Hua, Li Zeyu and Yan Bo for allowing use of their roof and for their incredible support since the beginning of the project. It has been a delight to work with friends and colleagues from Peking University, especially Assistant Professor Hua Fangyuan, Professor Lu Zhi, Liu Shuangqi, Zhang Shen, Ren Xiaotong and Yang Xiaotong. The team at the Beijing Forest and Parks Bureau are a joy to work with and wonderful advocates for biodiversity in Beijing. Dr. Andrew Farnsworth and Benjamin Van Doren from Cornell Lab of Ornithology have been a great source of inspiration and encouragement. Finally, a thank you to the many birders who have helped with identifications of some of the calls, including Jonas Buddemeier, Geoff Carey, David Darrell-Lambert, James Eaton, Paul Holt, James Lidster, Magnus Robb, Seán Ronayne and Joost Van Bruggen, to whom we owe a debt of gratitude.
More detail on the Beijing Nocturnal Migration Project, including results of the spring 2022 and the ongoing autumn 2022 projects, can be found here.
Have you ever wondered what birds are flying over your home at night? If you are on any sort of flyway, during the migration season it is possible that many hundreds, even thousands, of birds fly over your home in a single night. Recording sound during the dark hours can help to shed light on the number of birds and the diversity of species that are flying overhead as we sleep.
The practice of recording nocturnal flight calls (NFC) is gaining in popularity in Europe and the US (and elsewhere?) but is still in its relative infancy. Even with little knowledge of individual species’ calls, it is possible to gain an insight into the volume of birds that call as they pass overhead.
Of course most birders are also interested in identifying the species, but identification of the calls can be a challenge. Not only does successful ID require a strong knowledge of the vocalisations of many of the resident and migratory species in the area but it appears that some species use different calls at night to those with which we are familiar, thus adding to the difficulty. Lots of work is underway, including at Cornell Lab, to use AI to help scan recordings to identify the species but, for now at least, in East Asia that is a long way off.
With Beijing situated on a major flyway for birds commuting between Siberian breeding grounds and non-breeding grounds in China, SE Asia, Australasia and even Africa, there simply *must* be lots of nocturnal migration over the capital so, back in autumn 2017, living on the 13th floor of an apartment building at the time, I made my first attempts at nocturnal recording from my window. Using a simple digital recorder, I was able to record species such as Olive-backed Pipit (Anthus hodgsoni 树鹨 Shù liù), Eurasian Skylark (Alauda arvensis 云雀 Yúnquè), Great Bittern (Botaurus stellaris 大麻鳽 Dà má jiān) and Siberian Rubythroat (Luscinia calliope 红喉歌鸲 Hóng hóu gē qú). That experiment gave me a tantalising glimpse into the nocturnal migration over my apartment but a subsequent move to an apartment much less suitable for recording meant that the potential remained unfulfilled.
Fast forward to summer 2021 and, in a conversation with Sir Danny Alexander, Vice President of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), we hatched an idea to begin a recording project on the roof of AIIB’s headquarters. The building, 15 storeys high, is in a great location for such a project. It is immediately south of the Olympic Forest Park in the north of the city, not close to any major roads, suffers very little from aircraft noise and with almost no tall buildings close by.
The headquarters of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in Beijing.
We purchased a Wildlife Acoustics Song Meter Mini (weatherproof and programmable), and set it up on the roof, programming it to begin recording from 24 August until mid-November. The recorder is perfect for this project as the only maintenance needed is a change of batteries every two weeks or so. The recorder automatically adjusts the recording time to allow for the changing sunset and sunset times and a 512GB memory card is capable of storing all the files for the whole period.
The Wildlife Acoustics Song Meter Mini digital recorder.
The primary objective of this project is to gain an insight into the volume of birds flying over central Beijing at night. With identification of most calls straightforward, we hope to be able to gain an improved understanding of the timings, including peaks, of individual species and potentially also the relationship between weather patterns and the extent of migration. Given the impressive volume of calls, we are already building up a large file of “unidentified calls” and, with the help of birders in the region and experienced ‘nocmiggers’ elsewhere, we hope to identify as many of the unknowns as possible.
The files from the first few weeks of recording have been downloaded and we are beginning to analyse them. It’s a time-consuming process to go through them all but using the excellent free sound analysis software, “Audacity“, to produce spectograms in order to ‘visualise’ the files means it’s relatively easy to find the bird calls and skip through periods of silence.
A typical sonogram, in this case showing a visualisation of the calls of Eurasian Skylark (Alauda arvensis 云雀 Yúnquè).
More than 4,000 calls have been identified so far. Perhaps not surprisingly, in late August and September, the most dominant species have been Common Rosefinch (Carpodacus erythrinus 普通朱雀 Pǔtōng zhūquè), Olive-backed Pipit (Anthus hodgsoni 树鹨 Shù liù) and Eurasian Skylark (Alauda arvensis 云雀 Yúnquè) but these have been supported by a good selection of other species including Black-crowned Night Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax 夜鹭 Yè lù), Striated Heron (Butorides striata 绿鹭 Lǜ lù), Great Bittern (Botaurus stellaris 大麻鳽 Dà má jiān), Green Sandpiper (Tringa ochropus 白腰草鹬 Bái yāo cǎo yù), Common Sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos 矶鹬 Jī yù), Wood Sandpiper (Tringa glareola 林鹬 Lín yù), Common Redshank (Tringa totanus 红脚鹬 Hóng jiǎo yù), Eurasian Curlew (Numenius arquata 白腰杓鹬 Bái yāo biāo yù), Forest Wagtail (Dendronanthus indicus 山鹡鸰 Shān jí líng), white-eye sp. (Zosterops sp., 绣眼鸟 xiù yǎn niǎo), Yellow-bellied Tit (Periparus venustulus 黄腹山雀 Huáng fù shānquè), and lots of thrushes and Muscicapa flycatchers (still to be identified to species).
You can follow the progress of the project at this dedicated page, where we will upload good examples of calls, a batch of unidentified calls (on which we welcome suggestions!) and, in due course, some statistics about the volume of birds each night and a full species list. Analysis of all the files probably won’t be completed until well into 2022 but we are already excited about what this project will reveal about nocturnal bird migration in Beijing.
Huge thanks to the AIIB team, in particular Sir Danny Alexander, Alberto Ninio and Li Zeyu, for their support for this project and for their ongoing help and assistance. And thank you to David Darrell-Lambert for initial advice about NocMig and to Geoff Carey and Paul Holt for advice and assistance with identifications. Thanks also to all the birders in the East Asian Bird Vocalisation WeChat group and the NocMig WhatsApp group for help and assistance.
For the latest news about this project, to hear some of the calls we are recording and for a list of unidentified sounds, please see this dedicated page.
Header image: The Wildlife Acoustics Song Meter Mini in place on the roof of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in Beijing.
With biodiversity rising up the agenda due to the forthcoming UN negotiations due to take place in Kunming, China, in 2021, there is a lot happening here in Beijing and China.. on many fronts. Here’s a quick summary of an eventful last few weeks.
At the end of October, I was honoured to be invited by my good friend, Shen Chu (Becky), of the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) to Kunming in Yunnan to deliver a public lecture at an event to celebrate International Snow Leopard Day. With the exception of a couple of day trips into Hebei Province, this was my first trip out of Beijing this year. The event was hosted by the Elephant Bookstore in Kunming and, as well as a live public audience, the event was streamed online to more than a hundred thousand people. The organisers did a fantastic job, bringing together local artists, schools and musicians, and there was even a special Snow Leopard IPA produced by the local craft brewery which included a QR code with lots of facts about the Snow Leopard.
Speaking about the Valley of the Cats community-based conservation and wildlife-watching project in Kunming.Snow Leopard IPA. At 8% it’s a fitting strength for a beer celebrating the “King of the Mountains”!
With the city scheduled to host the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity next year, it was wonderful to see such energy – and innovative ideas – among local people to engage the public about nature and wildlife.
Just a few days later, I set off to the Valley of the Cats with a subset of these brilliant young people from Kunming. Having promised Becky several years ago to help her to see a Snow Leopard in the wild, there was an air of expectation as we landed in Yushu and made our way to the Valley. It was my first visit of the year to this magical place and, as always, it did not disappoint. We enjoyed a spectacular few days and treasured encounters with four Asian Brown Bears (an adult male and a separate mother with two cubs), a single Snow Leopard on a fresh kill of yak and a wonderful hike through some of the most stunning scenery I have seen.
On our last morning we stopped by Yunta’s house for a cup of tea. Yunta is one of the village leaders and has been a strong supporter of the Valley of the Cats project since its inception. It was early morning, around -10 degs C and I was shivering in four layers, yet Yunta was in a vest!
It was particularly encouraging to meet with a group of young local people who are keen to take on some of the running of the tourism project and to contribute to wildlife monitoring. Seeing their enthusiasm and pride in their local environment was heartwarming.
Just a few days after returning from Qinghai, I was delighted to hear that the Valley of the Cats community-based wildlife-watching tourism project had been named as a runner-up and received a “recognition of excellence” under the Nature Stewardship category of the Paulson Prize for Sustainability. Competing with more than a hundred projects across China, this was fantastic recognition for the local community. You can read about the winning projects – on battery recycling in Wuhan and wetland restoration in Haikou – here.
Having been part of the team to produce the report entitled “Financing Nature: Closing The Global Biodiversity Financing Gap”, the authors have been busy reaching out to as many influential governments, ministers, organisations and individuals as possible to try to influence the debate on how countries finance the USD 700 billion per year needed to protect our most important biodiversity and ecosystem services. That figure may sound like a lot of money – and it is – but to put it in context, it is less than the world spends each year on soft drinks. Governments have a fundamental role to create the right regulation that generates funding for nature. That means no longer allowing those that do harm to the environment to do so for free and rewarding those who protect and preserve. Perhaps not surprisingly, the figure of USD 700 billion could be reduced by around half by reforming harmful subsidies (specifically on agriculture, fisheries and forestry). It does seem out of step that, in the midst of a global biodiversity crisis, governments around the world are still paying people billions of dollars to employ practices that cause harm to our environment. This week I was invited to brief senior staff at the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in Beijing. As an organisation that funds many large infrastructure projects in developing countries, it was encouraging to hear about their enthusiasm for ensuring biodiversity and climate change criteria feature prominently in their lending criteria.
Handing over a copy of the “Financing Nature” report to Sir Danny Alexander, Vice President of AIIB.
A second meeting has now been planned to examine how AIIB can become a leader amongst multilateral development banks on this issue. There is a very long way to go to ensure that infrastructure projects are mandated to minimise harm to the environment and offset any unavoidable damage by investing in habitat protection and restoration elsewhere.. but that change is coming.. the only question is how fast?
Continuing the theme, last Saturday I participated in a discussion panel on biodiversity and climate change at the Caixin Global Summit in Beijing, an annual event that brings together an impressive line-up of people – from China and overseas – to discuss major global issues.
And the following day I participated in the launch of the Beijing government’s “Urban Forestry Network”, a group of c30 people who will develop proposals for improving the quality of the capital’s tree planting and biodiversity-related projects in Beijing. This network has the potential to make a big difference to how land is managed in Beijing, improving and restoring habitat for wildlife, and I look forward to playing an active role as the group develops its workplan.
Launch of the Beijing Urban Forestry Network on Sunday 15 November 2020.
You may be wondering if I have been able to do any birding recently and, sadly, the answer is no! However, I am looking forward to this Sunday when I will be accompanying the new UK Ambassador to China, Caroline Wilson, on a birding trip to Yeyahu, during which we will be discussing biodiversity, China and the importance of the UK and China working closely together, as hosts of the UN climate change and biodiversity negotiations respectively, to ensure these processes are reinforcing and lead to a successful outcome. It’s hugely encouraging to see the UK Ambassador taking a strong and early interest in these issues and I look forward to doing my bit to work for the strongest outcomes possible at both Kunming and Glasgow in 2021.
With Christmas in the UK out of the question this year due to the pandemic, I’m hoping for a few days of relaxation and birding around the capital. With waxwings arriving and the first snow today, the excitement of what might turn up is palpable. Will it be a Pallas’s Sandgrouse winter or could there be an influx of Asian Rosy Finches, or maybe even another of the special redstarts from the Tibetan Plateau. Can’t wait to get out there and explore!
