Birds of Barandabhar Corridor Forest, Chitwan, Nepal

Long term monitoring of bird species was conducted in Barandabhar Corridor Forest, one of the important bird areas of Nepal (IBA). Bird species were identified by the point count method in transect surveys in two-time frames from 2002–2012 and 2015–2016 to obtain the bird species list. We compared our bird list with previously published (after 2000) checklists and compiled the updated checklist of birds of Barandabhar Corridor Forest. We documented 372 bird species belonging to 80 families in Barandabhar, including five Critically Endangered, three Endangered, eight Vulnerable, and 15 Near Threatened species. The Accipitridae family included the highest number of species (n= 32), followed by Muscicapidae (n= 30) and Anatidae (n= 18). Approximately, half of the total confirmed bird species were insectivorous. The list included 63% resident, 27% winter migratory, 7.5% summer migratory, and 2.9% passage migrant species. According to the habitat type, there were 181 species of forest, 74 species of wetland, 24 species of grassland, 70 species of open field, and 23 species of partially wetland birds. This updated checklist of bird species will serve as a reference guide for bird watchers, biodiversity researchers, and support managers for conservation effort; and can be used to track any changes in the composition of bird species in the future.

Preliminary Checklists of Birds for the Fura and Furagosa Wildlife Community Based Conservation Area, in Mirab-Abaya District, Gamo Zone, Southern Ethiopia

The field visit was conducted at Fura and Furagosa community based wildlife conservation area in February 2021. The survey aims to prepare a primary bird checklist. Transect walk data collection method was employed. The record of bird list was presented in a descriptive statics. 37 bird species were recorded during the survey time. Of the species recorded, 25 species were residents, 10 species Palearctic migrants and 2 Intra-African migrants. The survey suggests that further systematic studies of biodiversity are needed.

Rare birds in Nepal

This paper aimed to fulfil the knowledge gap on the status of vagrants and rare birds of Nepal. Records of all Nepal’s bird species that were previously considered vagrants by the National Red List of Nepal’s Birds (2016) were collated and detailed with localities, dates and observers. Species recorded since 2016, including vagrant species, were also covered. A total of 92 species was assessed to determine if they were vagrants, that is species that had a total of 10 or less records. It was concluded that six species are no longer vagrant and we recommend these for national red list assessment. Nepal currently has a total of 71 vagrant species. In addition, four vagrant species have still to be accepted by the Nepal Rare Birds Committee before they can be officially included on the Nepal bird list. Nine species have so far only been recorded in the 19th century. Red-faced liocichla Liocichla phoenicea, was previously one of these, but was re-found In Nepal after the National Red List was published in 2016; it is a very rare and very local resident. Himalayan grasshopper-warbler Locustella kashmirensis is a recent split and now considered a full species (instead of a subspecies); it is probably an altitudinal migrant in Nepal. Despite great advances in our ornithological knowledge of Nepal, there is still high potential to find new species, especially of passerine birds and in the less explored parts of the country.

FIFTH REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE FOR ECUADORIAN RECORDS IN ORNITHOLOGY (CERO), WITH COMMENTS ON SOME PUBLISHED, UNDOCUMENTED RECORDS

Wepresent new distributional records of birds in Ecuador evaluated by the Committee for Ecuadorian Records in Ornithology (CERO) from November 2017 through June 2019. This report includes two species new to Ecuador (Pelecanoides garnotii, Conirostrum margaritae), five species with first documented country records (Thaumastura cora, Anous minutus, Setophaga pensylvanica, S. virens, Spiza americana), two species with first documented Galapagos records (Oceanodroma hornbyi, Egretta tricolor), remarkable range extensions for 15 species (Amazilia amazilia, Aramus guarauna, Vanellus chilensis, Attagis gayi, Anous stolidus, Sterna hirundo, Thalasseus elegans, T. sandvicensis, Eurypyga helias, Mycteria americana, Plegadis falcinellus, Gampsonyx swainsonii, Rosthramus sociabilis, Glaucidium peruanum, Thlypopsis sordida), new records of 16 rare species (Oressochen jubatus, Spatula cyanoptera, Podiceps major, Stercorarius longicaudus, Larus belcheri, Pelagodroma marina, Oceanodroma markhami, Egretta rufescens, Plegadis ridgwayi, Buteo swainsonii, Megascops koepckeae, Tyrannus albogularis, Setophaga castanea, Dolichonyx oryzivorus, Icterus chrysater, I. galbula) and additional records for 8 species. Finally, we invalidate previous records of Pyrilia pyrilia published in different sources, reject records of six species submitted to CERO, and discuss six previously published, undocumented records that might prove erroneous. CERO revises and updates the country bird list, which currently stands at 1696 species (1642 confirmed and documented; 54 undocumented).

Towards reconciliation of the four world bird lists: hotspots of disagreement in taxonomy of raptors

There are currently four world bird lists referenced by different stakeholders including governments, academic journals, museums and citizen scientists. Consolidation of these lists is a conservation and research priority. In reconciling lists, care must be taken to ensure agreement in taxonomic concepts—the actual groups of individual organisms circumscribed by a given scientific epithet. Here, we compare species-level taxonomic concepts for raptors across the four lists, highlighting areas of disagreement. Of the 665 species-level raptor taxa observed at least once among the four lists, only 453 (68%) were consistent across all four lists. The Howard and Moore Checklist of the Birds of the World contains the fewest raptor species (528), whereas the International Ornithological Community World Bird List contains the most (580) and these two lists are in the most disagreement. Of the disagreements, 67% involved owls, and Indonesia was the country containing the most disagreed upon species (169). Finally, we calculated the amount of species-level agreement across lists for each avian order and found raptor orders spread throughout the rankings of agreement. Our results emphasize the need to reconcile the four world bird lists for all avian orders, highlight broad disagreements across lists and identify hotspots of disagreement for raptors, in particular.