Bird Camp

This year, traditional spring ringing camp at oxbow lake Savica in Zagreb (only 4 km from the city ceneter) started on April, 1st. During weekend April 8-9, visits for birdwatchers attending the \"Ornithological School\" will be organized with special attention to the life cicle of migratory birds, scientific study on bird migration and status of migratory birds in Croatia.

An overnight camp will be organized at Imbwa Sewage Ponds, 40 km outside Harare. School children, teachers, BirdLife Zimbabwe members and staff, and representatives of government departments will be invited. There will be waterbird counts at the ponds, ringing of waterbirds and discussions on avian influenza and migratory birds.

On that particular day a birdwatching trip will be organised at the Farakka Barrage site where thousands of migratory waterbirds are coming during winter months. This birdwatching trip is meant for local people and school children for awareness generation about birds of the region.

We plan to involve local school children from 2 different schools: Ndindika day Secondary school and Nangarua Primary school. The students and pupils will be involved in morning birdwatching, talk or lecture and video show on migratory birds, drawing or painting different birds as per our theme for this year: Migratory birds and climate change. We also plan games that potray bird in migration.

A field trip will be organised, visiting Ayrag Lake, a Ramsar Site in western Mongolia. Participants of the trip are biology students of Khovd University. The activity is sponsored by the project \"Support of HUN Club’s conservation and public awareness activities in western Mongolia\" which is supported by the Asian Waterbird Conservation Fund which is administered by WWF Hong Kong.

For the World Migratory Bird Day we are planning to produce a bird watching manual. It will be distributed to students who are attending our programme. Special lectures on birds and bird ringing will be conducted and a one-day bird watching excursion in the forest area will be implemented, too.

Every year the FMF-HMF organize, with the support of NABU (Germany) and Legambiente (Italy) an international camp for monitoring prenutial raptors migration on the Central Mediterranean Sea. At the same time FMF-HMF organizes educational activities for local schools and other interested people. As from this year FMF organizes special invitations at the Fortino for the WMBD event.

i) -Awareness campaigns on WMBD, wild birds, climate change and African Flyways in schools (primary school, Secondary/High School and University)
ii) -Meeting with an association of poultry farmers to share information on the role of wild birds in the progation of bird flu.
iii) -Search, arrange and distribute handouts related to migratory birds, bird flu, African flyway and climate change
iv) -Press briefing/media coverage/interviews on the role of migratory birds in a changing climate and information on Africa Flyway concept.

CREW together with the Regional Museum of Natural History, a Government of India administered organisation, and through its team of experts will conduct a field programme titled “Birds of Madhya Pradesh\" at Pachmahri from 18-20 May, 2007. The target group at this bird camp are school and college teachers. During the camp, we plan to have lecture demonstrations, screening of films of birds and field trips.

To observe the WMBD, CREW will join hands with another NGO ARPAN (Awanti Rehabilitation Programmes and Action Networking) Society to organise a two day bird camp on May 12 and 13 for rural children, mostly belonging to the economically backward and disadvantaged families, in and around Bhopal, the Central Indian State of Madhya Pradesh.