Birds Korea is a small, unbiased and specialised NGO that’s devoted to the conservation of birds and their habitats in Korea and the broader Yellow Sea Ecoregion.
We conduct focused analysis with a purpose to develop plans and designs that may assist help the conservation of biodiversity in accordance each with nationwide legal guidelines and insurance policies (as outlined within the Nationwide Biodiversity Technique and Motion Plan) and the Sustainable Growth Objectives; and we then use this identical analysis to help evidence-based advocacy and academic work. Whereas all species are vital, our restricted capability signifies that most of our work tends to concentrate on the conservation of nationally or globally threatened species and of internationally vital websites, e.g., as recognized by the applying of Ramsar standards.
We now have at all times been open to collaboration with accountable companions; and as such are energetic in e.g., the newly-established eBird Korea Group; within the East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership’s Scaly-sided Merganser Process Drive; and in collaborations for the conservation of cranes and extra threatened species within the internal border area of Korea, most particularly by means of the work of Birds Korea’s Imjin-Hantan Area Consultant Baek Seung-Kwang and likewise by means of our long-standing MOU with the Hanns Seidel Basis.
Along with importing and exporting greatest info on key chook species and habitats, our work in 2025 included:
- All year long, persevering with our long-term conservation work within the Yeoncheon Imjin River Biosphere Reserve, with monetary help from Yeoncheon County, Gyeonggi Province and a small grant from the EAAFP. As a part of this, we continued to watch cranes within the CCZ and Scaly-sided Mergansers inside the Yeoncheon Imjin River Flyway Community Web site; we gathered extra information on Lengthy-billed Plovers; and we surveyed a number of areas, with the intention of bettering understanding of the distribution of birds and extra biodiversity. As in earlier years, we then used this 12 months’s analysis to suggest restoration ideas and 5 key suggestions, which have been submitted to Yeoncheon County and Gyeonggi Province. English and Korean editions of our report on this work will probably be accessible on request to Birds Korea members. Additionally funded by Yeoncheon County and Gyeonggi Province, Birds Korea Yeoncheon additionally performed a number of education schemes, printed a second small photo-guide; and with college college students helped within the design of a signboard on Scaly-sided Mergansers which has now been erected within the Biosphere Reserve;
2. In Busan, beginning a Society for Ecological Restoration-Microsoft supported collaborative pilot restoration challenge being developed by means of our MOU with the Busan Nakdong River Challenge Administration Workplace. This energetic collaboration consists of specialists on the Nakdong Estuary Eco-centre; the corporate Land Aura; vegetation restoration specialists in a group led by Professor Byun Chaeho; 새덕후 Korean Birder; and varied Birds Koreans, together with Dr Kim Su-Kyung and Professor Amael Borzee along with Dr Nial Moores and Nationwide Coordinator Park Meena. This pilot challenge goals to assist restore habitat of Japanese Taiga Bean Geese alongside the Nakdong River whereas attempting to scale back the chook strike threat to plane flying out and in of the airport in Gimhae. The restoration work itself will begin in 2026 with a discipline used for synthetic feeding of geese in Maekdo Ecopark.
3. In spring and autumn, persevering with analysis on chook migration hotspot Baengnyeong Island, the place 400 species of chook have now been recorded since 2013;
4. In June, conducting 5 days of fundamental analysis on the Critically Endangered Chinese language Crested Tern alongside the mainland coast, as a part of time spent with seabird specialists, together with Peter Harrison;
5. In the summertime, offering recommendation by means of a personal firm to an area authorities on methods to scale back the unintended unfavourable impacts of proposed website administration on birds inside a delegated Flyway Community Web site;
6. In August, a number of members serving to to evaluate the response of shorebirds and extra threatened waterbird species to the so-called “blue carbon” seawalls constructed throughout the tidal flat inside what is meant to be the strictly-protected Hwaseong Maehyangri Tidal Flat Wetland Protected Space in Gyeonggi Province. Our analysis discovered that many species of shorebird tried to keep away from the seawall, decreasing time accessible to e.g., globally Endangered Far Japanese Curlew for foraging and for roosting on the tidal flat;
7. In October, serving to to facilitate a nationwide and regional eBird assembly in Incheon, which resulted within the evolution of a a lot bigger South Korea eBird group headed up by Dr Jungmoon Ha;
8. And all year long, taking an energetic position in calling for a lot larger analysis to evaluate the bird-strike threat at airports, together with newly proposed airports inside or inside 8km of internationally vital wetlands. Along with submitting an opinion and knowledgeable testimony to the court docket case on Saemangeum New Airport in 2024, we additionally performed fastened level counts on the proposed Gadeokdo Worldwide Airport in Busan with the outcomes highlighted in an opinion submitted to the court docket. As posted on our weblog,“90 hours of seen migration counts over 16 dates in Daehang, Gadeokdo, Busan, this September (2025) resulted in 12,837 -17,117 particular person birds counted, with the 5 most quite a few species Chinese language Sparrowhawk Tachyspiza soloensis 붉은배새매 (7,604-11,046); Pacific (Fork-tailed) Swift Apus pacificus 칼새 (1,648-1,907); White-throated Needletail Hirundapus caudacutus 바늘꼬리칼새 (757-957); “Massive White-headed Gulls” (1,330); and Black-tailed Gull Larus crassirostris 괭이갈매기 (650-700).” The size of chook migration by means of this proposed airport website, at closest inside 6km or so of the strictly protected Nakdong Estuary, was captured fantastically by Korean Birder새덕후, Korea’s main wildlife YouTuber.
In 2026, we:
- Hope to proceed our work within the internal border space of Korea, together with in Yeoncheon County and on Baengnyeong Island;
2. Will proceed our participation within the South Korea eBird Group and EAAFP Scaly-sided Merganser Process Drive;
3. Will make additional progress with the collaborative pilot restoration challenge in Busan, and if help is discovered, assist to begin to body a 10-year imaginative and prescient doc for biodiversity conservation alongside the Nakdong River and inside the Nakdong Estuary for consideration by different teams and decision-makers;
4. Will proceed calling for acceptable chook analysis to evaluate the chook strike threat as referred to as for by steerage developed by the Worldwide Civilian Aviation Organisation, together with on the proposed worldwide airport on Gadeokdo and within the Hwaseong Wetlands Flyway Community Web site, and on Incheon’s Baengnyeong Island;
5. Will proceed with the event of a brand new on-line area which may help us to enhance communication with and between our members, whereas organizing info in methods that may higher help our shared conservation mission.
- Should you help the goals of our work, please be a part of us. Membership begins at solely 10,000 Korean Gained monthly. When you’ve got information and expertise related to our mission, and / or actual ardour for conservation and time to present, please contact us to change into a volunteer.
