Wind power development in Eastern Kazakhstan threatens migration of eagles

On the basis of data obtained from ARGOS/GPS and GPS/GSM tracking of 34 eagles (4 Steppe Eagles (Aquila nipalensis) from Central KZ, 1 Steppe Eagle from Southern Ural region, 22 Steppe Eagles, 5 Eastern Imperial Eagles (Aquila heliaca) from the ASR and 2 Greater Spotted Eagles (Aquila clanga) from the from the Altai-Sayan Ecoregion), we have defined the main flyways, terms, and other parameters of migration of eagles through Eastern Kazakhstan. We have outlined the borders of the migration corridor and estimate the number of migrants passing through it. The study highlights the importance of the Karatau ridge for eagles from the vast territories of Russia and Kazakhstan. But we are also concerned about the development of wind farms with horizontal-axis wind turbines that expose ultimate danger for raptors in the Karatau migration corridor. One of them already exists – the Zhanatas Wind-Power Station. Here we calculated the possible negative impact on the eagle population from the existing and projected wind farms of the Karatau ridge and give our recommendations for neutralizing the damage from the development of the electric power industry in Karatau.

Return Migration from the Gulf Region to India Amidst COVID-19

The Covid-19 pandemic has directly affected the millions of migrant workers in Gulf countries, mostly employed as temporary labour in construction and allied sectors. The Gulf region historically has been the most favoured destination for such jobs. However, the pandemic crisis has halted construction projects in these countries as the drastic fall in oil prices has affected Gulf oil and non-oil economies severely. This has had an adverse effect on Indian migrant workers as they face the threat of unemployment, leading to their voluntary or forced return to India. For example, at the end of 2020, half a million Kerala emigrants, most of them in the Gulf, had lost their jobs abroad due to the pandemic, making their return inevitable given their temporary status in these countries. This chapter examines how India is prepared to handle the changing trends in Indo-Gulf migration corridor and the subsequent return emigration from the Gulf. The chapter highlights major sending-state perspectives, such as that of Kerala and others, and their responses towards Gulf returnees. Moreover, it provides insights by revisiting the existing economic and social security measures for returning migrants and their families within the framework of state welfare schemes, thereby examining rehabilitation and re-integration mechanisms for return migrants at the central and state levels in India.

The first documented migration of a potter wasp, Ancistrocerus adiabatus (Hymenoptera: Vespidae: Eumeninae)

Eumenine wasps are not known to be migratory and have never been proposed as migrants, let alone documented as such. We document a large-scale migration of a common eumenine, Ancistrocerus adiabatus, during which 44 000–68 000 wasps moved through a known migration corridor in southwestern Ontario, Canada, in less than an hour. Evidence for migration of another eumenine, Pachodynerus erynnis, six species of flower flies (Diptera, Syrphidae), and two dragonflies (Odonata) is also provided. We hope that this note encourages naturalists to focus their attention on insects at known migration concentration sites to learn more about this grossly understudied aspect of animal behaviour.

Shade affects magnitude and tactics of juvenile Chinook salmon antipredator behavior in the migration corridor

Environmental conditions strongly affect antipredator behaviors; however, it is less known how migrating prey adjust antipredator behavior in migration corridors, in part, because active migrants are difficult to observe and study. Migrants are vulnerable and encounter many predators in the corridor, and their propensity to travel towards their destination ties antipredator behavior with movement. We evaluated how environmental risk cues in the migration corridor including in-water habitat structure (present, absent) and overhead shade (sun, shade), and salmon origin (hatchery, wild) affected how juvenile Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) reacted to a live predator. We measured how salmon react to predation risk as the difference in time to swim downstream through a 9.1-m long field enclosure with or without a live predatory largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides). Shade significantly modified the reaction to the predator, and it did so in two ways. First, the magnitude of antipredator behavior was larger in shade compared to direct sun, which suggests salmon perceived shade to be a riskier environment than sun. Second, the escape tactic also varied; salmon slowed down to be cautious in shade and sped up in sun. Structure did not significantly affect behavior and hatchery and wild salmon behaved similarly. Our study suggests that environmental risk cues can shape the magnitude and tactics of how migrants react to predation risk and illustrates how these responses relate to movement with potential to scale up and affect migration patterns.

Golden Eagle Abundance in Alaska: Migration Counts and Movement Data Generate a Conservative Population Estimate

ABSTRACT Estimating species density and abundance is challenging but important for establishing conservation and management strategies. Significant progress has been made toward estimating Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) abundance in the conterminous United States of America (USA) but much less is known about eagle abundance in Alaska. Here, we paired migration count and GPS-tracking data collected near Gunsight Mountain, Alaska, in a Bayesian framework to estimate the number of Golden Eagles in south-central Alaska. We estimated 1204 (95% credible interval: 866, 1526) potentially breeding (≥4 yr old) Golden Eagles annually moved through the Gunsight Mountain migration corridor and summered over an area of 150,325 km2 in south-central Alaska, equating to a density of 0.80 potentially breeding eagles/100 km2. By extrapolating across the species' nesting range in Alaska (1,180,489 km2) and incorporating published productivity and age-specific survival rates for eagles <4 yr old into our hierarchical model, we estimated 12,717 (95% credible interval: 9043, 16,349) Golden Eagles of all ages occur in Alaska, annually. We propose this as a conservative statewide population estimate because we used methods that likely underestimated population size. Even so, our estimate is three to five times larger than previous estimates and likely represents about one quarter of the USA's population.

Seasonal Activity of Urban Bats Populations in Temperate Climate Zone—A Case Study from Southern Poland

Municipal greenery can mitigate the negative impact of urbanization on biodiversity, including bats, by providing a migration corridor, food base and roosts. Our study aimed to evaluate the species composition and diversity, test the differences in activity between seasons, and identify the atmospheric conditions influencing the bats’ activity in the Planty Park (Cracow). Fieldworks were conducted in 2016 and 2017. We recorded 10 species, two new for this part of Poland: the Kuhl’s pipistrelle (Pipistrellus kuhlii) and the Savi’s pipistrelle (Hypsugo savii). Taxa were divided into three ecological guilds. Myotis group’s activity was insufficient to perform statistical analyses. The activity of Nyctalus, Eptesicus and Vespertilio group peaked in late summer. A similar insignificant trend was observed for Pipistrellus and Hypsugo. Temperature enhanced the activity of Nyctalus, Eptesicus and Vespertilio group in spring and early summer, while cloud cover suppressed their activity in autumn. Temperature also enhanced Pipistrellus and Hypsugo group activity in spring and autumn, but it suppressed their summer activity. Our study is one of the first to investigate temperate urban bats’ phenology and may serve as a preface for further research to introduce detailed urban landscape planning recommendations.

Returning home empty handed: Examining how COVID-19 exacerbates the non-payment of temporary migrant workers’ wages

The crisis unleashed by COVID-19 has profoundly impacted the world of work, with many workers losing their jobs or with insufficient safety measures in place for those still in work. Migrant workers are among the precarious workforce that is employed in particularly affected sectors where they have been subjected to labour rights’ violations for a long time. The pandemic has further exposed and exacerbated the exploitation of migrant workers in particular, as evident from the widespread occurrence of the non- or underpayment of wages for work that has been carried out. Despite the efforts made in recent years at the global level to arrive at a common framework to regulate international labour migration in accordance with international human and labour rights’ standards, little progress has been achieved on the issue of wage theft. This article analyses the reasons why the institutional architecture in place is ineffective to tackle the settlement of outstanding wage claims. We use the concept of access to justice as a starting point and steer our examination towards global advocacy as epitomised by a concerted campaign by an alliance between civil society organisations (CSOs) and global union confederations, which calls for the implementation of a justice mechanism for repatriated migrant workers. Our analysis is specifically centred on low-wage migrants on temporary, employer-tied contracts as illustrated by the South Asia–Middle East/Gulf migration corridor.

Warming in the upper San Francisco Estuary: Patterns of water temperature change from 5 decades of data

Temperature is a key controlling variable from subcellular to ecosystem scales. Thus, climatic warming is expected to have broad impacts, especially in economically and ecologically valuable systems such as estuaries. The heavily managed upper San Francisco Estuary (SFE) supplies water to millions of people and is home to fish species of high conservation, commercial, and recreational interest. Despite a long monitoring record (> 50 years), we do not yet know how water temperatures have already changed or how trends vary spatially or seasonally. We fit generalized additive models on an integrated database of discrete water temperature observations to estimate long-term trends with spatio-seasonal variability. We found that water temperatures have increased 0.017 °C/year on average over the past 50 years. Rates of temperature change have varied over time, but warming was predominant. Temperature increases were most widespread in the late-fall to winter (November to February) and mid-spring (April to June), coinciding with the winter development of juvenile Chinook Salmon and spring spawning window of the endangered Delta Smelt. Warming was fastest in the northern regions, a key fish migration corridor with important tidal wetland habitat. However, no long-term temperature trends were detected in October and were only observed in some regions in May, July, and August. These results can help identify optimal areas for restoration or refugia to buffer the effects of a warming climate, and the methods can be leveraged to understand the spatiotemporal variability in climate warming patterns in other aquatic systems.

MIGRANT WORKERS AS A RESOURCE FOR THE DEMOGRAPHIC DEVELOPMENT OF RUSSIA AND THE REPUBLIC OF KAZAKHSTAN

The article discusses the features of the demographic development of Russia and Kazakhstan in modern conditions and the medium term. The scientific problem of the study is to identify the features of the current stage and prospects of demographic development and the contribution of migration to the formation of the population and labor resources of Russia and the Republic of Kazakhstan. It was revealed that Russia and the Republic of Kazakhstan became the two largest countries for the reception of migrants in the Eurasian space. The prerequisites for large-scale and active labor migration to these states are demographic trends, growing labor requirements and the relatively successful economic development of the two countries. The key labor donors for both countries are currently Central Asian states. So, between the countries of the region on the one hand, Russia and the Republic of Kazakhstan, on the other hand, the Eurasian migration corridor has formed, which is currently one of the largest on a global scale. In both countries, it is necessary to strengthen the direction of migration policy associated with attracting labor migrants as a resource for demographic development. Despite the temporary stay in the host countries, many labor migrants pass into the category of permanent residents of Russia and the Republic of Kazakhstan. Russia, as the main host country, has not yet fully benefited from the demographic advantages of the Euro-Asian migration corridor. The country's migration policy remains quite tough and inadequate in the demographic situation. Although the approach seems to be declared at the state level that migration should be one of the development resources, many obstacles to the integration of migrants, including migrants from Central Asian countries, the main donor region, remain in the system of migration policy itself, in its mechanisms and implementation tools. The Republic of Kazakhstan, although it has not yet encountered the demographic problem in a form like Russia, can already consider labor migration as a resource for future development in pragmatic interests. It is noted that both Russia and the Republic of Kazakhstan, as countries receiving labor migrants, should emphasize in their migration policy the integration of part of labor migrants into the host society.