By Nonna Chernyakova Ornithologists are aflutter over the news that the endangered Chinese egret has moved its breeding grounds 600 kilometers north from the Korean peninsula to Primorye, forced to new environs by airplanes and overzealous bird watchers. In a nation accustomed to environmental bad news ranging from the dumping of radioactive waste in the sea to the navy's occasional shelling of an island bird colony near Vladivostok, the select community of birdwatchers was overjoyed to learn that Russia now hosts its own breeding grounds for the rare and beautiful egrets. "It is a sensation," said Natalia Litvinenko, one of the ornithologists who discovered the new breeding grounds. "It gives the species a chance to survive, as the bird happened to choose a marine reserve territory." (The egrets are far from the area that the navy uses for target practice.) In summer of 1998, Natalia Litvinenko and Andrei Shibayev, ornithologists with the Far Eastern Institute of Biology and Soil Studies, noticed a few Chinese egret pairs on Furugelm Island in Peter the Great Bay near the mouth of the Tumen River, which forms the boundary between Russia and China and North Korea. The couple go there every summer to study birds colonies. This year they went to the island to confirm that the bird had chosen it as a breeding site. The Chinese egret's total breeding population is estimated as 960 pairs. They were hunted close to extermination last century for their beautiful feathers, which are as delicate as lace, giving the birds the appearance of brides during breeding season. The scientists, who have been regularly visiting Furugelm Island since the early 1970s, say that until 1992 they had never seen Chinese egrets there. Since then, they noticed a few egrets feeding in coastal lagoons, and sometimes they recorded them flying above the island. Until this year, however, the Chinese egret was regarded as a "vagrant bird" in Russia. They were seen in Primorye only alone or in small flocks. This time the scientists found about 40 pairs nesting in the bushes and grass on Furugelm Island. The adult birds fly to feed 15 to 20 kilometers to the mainland, because the island offers little food for them. Litvinenko said that the only place the birds were breeding so far was a few tiny islands in the Yellow Sea that run along the Korean peninsula. Not far from one of their sites, the South Koreans built a huge international airport, and this forced the birds out. The birds' colony left another island, ironically, because of the swarms of "nature-loving photographers who would flood the island, come close to the nests, and shoot pictures of their chicks," Litvinenko said. The bird is a small heron - sometimes even smaller than a seagull. It usually breeds near nesting grounds of the gray heron. "But when the island is covered with fog or during a typhoon, the gray herons sit and wait until it is gone, but the Chinese egrets fly where they need to," Litvinenko said. "Their chicks are equally courageous - they try to fly above the sea and play with other birds and little fish." Litvinenko is a longtime birdwatcher who has taken on the Soviet and Russian government for its disregard of wildlife closer to Vladivostok. In 1971, she was on an island in Peter the Great Bay when the navy began bombing it for target practice. The island was close to the border of a bird reserve and home to thousands of birds. In April of this year, Litvenko discovered exploded shells and hundreds of dead birds on the island after a similar target practice. But the Chinese egrets are out of harm's way on Furugelm Island. Alexei Tyurin, scientific director of the Institute of Marine Biology, which works in cooperation with the ornithologists, said it was an interesting discovery they made. "There is a new species in the list of Russian fauna," he said. Tyurin noted that a similar discovery like that was made in 1996: An Arctic puffin moved its breeding site from the far northeastern Russia to Stenina Island, in the same marine reserve. Ornithologist Igor Katin and student Ivan Piunov found three holes the birds had dug on the island. This year there were 150 pairs of puffins breeding on the Stenina. © copyright 1998 the Vladivostok News. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed in any form. [Back to News page]  [Back to Front page]  [Write to us]