Sociable Plover
Surfbirds News: RSPB Archives
Sociable lapwing finds some friends
Hopes are rising for one of the world's rarest birds after the discovery of the largest flock seen for more than 100 years.
More than 3,000 critically endangered sociable lapwings have been found in the Ceylanpinar district of south-eastern Turkey after a satellite tag was fitted to one of the birds migrating from breeding grounds in Kazakhstan.
Sociable Plover from the surfbirds galleries © Leander Khil
The tracked lapwing had flown more than 2,000 miles from its nesting site, where numbers of the species have plunged following the collapse of Soviet farming. The bird flew north of the Caspian Sea, then down through the Caucasus and south into Turkey.
Other birds including geese, albatrosses and bald ibis have been fitted with satellite tags before but the sociable lapwing is the smallest bird yet to carry such a tracking device.
The RSPB's Dr Rob Sheldon, who tagged the bird in Kazakhstan, said: 'This discovery is something we didn't dare dream of. The sociable lapwing is one of the rarest birds on earth and suddenly it's been found in these large numbers.
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