Swan song

A Chinese Crowtit (Paradoxornis Heudei) clutches a reed in the Beidagang wetlands in Tianjin on May 6, 2012. Photo: courtesy of Ma Jingsheng

Migratory birds, including two flying Tundra Swans and several Swan Geese, take to the water in the Beidagang wetlands in Tianjin on March 15, 2011. Photo: courtesy of Ma Jingsheng

Qingdao, a coastal city in East China's Shandong province, is a temporary home to an estimated 2.8 million migratory birds, including rare species like the Whooper Swan and Mandarin Duck, which descend on the area every spring and autumn. Bird lovers flock to the area to see the spectacle in the warmer months, before winter comes to drive them away.

But on November 22, a disaster struck both people and the birds. The human effects were felt immediately when an oil pipeline exploded and killed 62 people. The effects on local bird life were not immediately apparent, but within a month, bodies of birds began washing up along the coastline due to polluted sea water, said Zhang Shiping, vice president of the Qingdao Wildlife Salvation Association.

Qingdao's future as a haven for migratory birds is now in doubt, as is the future of migratory birds nationwide. Rapid industrialization and urbanization is threatening the future of bird species across the country, with migratory birds being particularly susceptible to the loss of habitat.

Missing birds

Since the blast, Zhang Shiping and his team have saved about 20 migratory birds in the seas around Qingdao.

None of them survived.

But Zhang is not giving up. During a routine beach patrol on Sunday, he discovered a Black-throated Loon standing in the water, with oil covering its entire body.

"I saw she was cleaning her feathers with her mouth. If the oil enters her body, she will die of poisoning," Zhang said. "With the oil on his feathers, the bird can't fly. The oil should be disposed of with a special cleaner. It's a pity that I had no speedboat to get close to her."

But what worries Zhang is not the effects of the blast, despite their toll on bird life. Of more concern is the swift disappearance of the local wetlands. "It means the birds will have no place to rest and look for food, and they will die of fatigue and hunger," Zhang said.

The area occupied by the wetlands near Jiaozhou Bay in Qingdao has been dwindling in recent years.

From 1986 to 2010, the area that remains dry during high tide decreased from 1,733 hectares to 357 hectares, and the area of mudflats that are submerged under high tide dropped from 9,600 hectares to 5,897 hectares, according to the investigations of Zhang Xuliang, an associate geography professor with Qingdao University.

Construction sites are also taking a toll on the area, and as developments proliferate animal rights activists feel like they are fighting a losing battle, according to the professor.

The number of bird species occupying the bay is noticeably dwindling. In 1985, 206 species were believed to be living in the area, but now there are only 156. Among the 140 species of waterfowl in the bay, 21 are listed in the international and national rare or endangered lists, the Nandu Daily reported.

Disappearing wetlands

China has lost 51 percent of its costal wetlands in the past 50 years, according to a recent report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Over the past 10 years, 2.9 percent of China's 40 millions of hectares of wetlands have disappeared, which threatens the livelihoods of 300 million people in China, according to the second national wetlands investigation conducted from 2009 to 2013, the Shanghai-based First Financial Daily reported.

"The loss of wetlands results in fewer migratory birds. Some migratory birds die because of the lack of food and some die because they are exhausted from flying," said Liu Huili, chief executive officer of the Beijing-based National Birds Protection Network.

Zhang Shiping noticed the changes. He said he saw 50 Common Shelducks in the seas around Qingdao last winter, but none have arrived this time.

The Dongting Lake in Hunan province, second largest fresh water lake in China - an important wetland not just in China but worldwide - also faces the same situation. The withering wetlands around the lake are proving unable to provide the food necessary for the birds which frequent them in warmer months.

In the 1990s, there were over 200,000 birds which dwelt in the lake. That figure was less than 100,000 in 2005 and 2006, weather.com.cn reported in May, 2013.

"This is closely related to the birds' roosting habits and changes in feeding," Zhang Hong, a chief engineer of the lake's nature reserve, was quoted as saying by weather.com.cn, adding that the lowering of the lake's water level due to drought is the main factor affecting bird populations.

"Migrant birds and wetlands are part of the ecosystem," Liu Huili said. "If the bird population is falling, it means there is something wrong with the climate, the air or human behavior. But this is always neglected by people who are solely pursuing profit."

Encroaching developments

The reductions to China's wetlands are mainly caused by human activities such as farming, the overuse of wetlands and the development of real estate, said Liu Hongbin, a retired professor with the Institute of Marine Development at Ocean University of China in Qingdao.

Since 2002 there have been over 20 construction projects around the Jiaozhou Bay that were in some way related to maritime issues. They have occupied about 20 square kilometers of ocean, the Nandu Daily reported.

Some waterways near Jiaozhou Bay were dug up in December for landscaping purposes, and a new residential community is under construction in the area.

Liu Huili said that investigations by National Birds Protection Network discovered that in many cases, developments did not undergo environmental evaluations, or even provided false information in order to develop wetlands.

In 2012, a real estate developer purchased wetlands around the Erhai Lake in Yunnan Province in. He later promoted a development in the area using the advertisement "27 hectares of wetland, a sailboat club and a six-star restaurant."

"China lacks usable land. When economic development conflicts with the environment, local governments choose economic development, claiming the wetlands are wasted land," Liu Huili said.