Myanmar’s Forestry Department is instructing the public not to catch migrating birds after a resident of Minkin Township, Sagaing Region, shot down and wounded a migrating Mongolian steppe eagle with a slingshot on December 6.
The eagle was one of several fitted with a GPS device and released by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) in Mongolia. WCS is monitoring steppe eagles’ migratory and hibernating patterns and is now in touch with Myanmar’s Forestry Department.
“We are in touch with a bird research team in Mongolia that released the bird. When the steppe eagle is able to fly, we will set it free. The GPS relies on solar power battery. We will take care of it until it fully recovers,” Win Naing Thaw, director of the department’s Nature and Wildlife Conservation Division, told the Myanmar Times.
The bird is now receiving treatment for injuries to its left wing and eye at Mandalay’s Yadanabon Zoological Garden.
Myanmar lies along two of the world’s nine major bird migration routes – the Central Asian flyway and East Asian Australasian flyway. Thousands of burds, largely from Russia, migrate through Myanmar every winter between November and March. Half of the bird varieties found in Myanmar are migratory.
However, this is the first time a steppe eagle has been found in the country. The species usually migrates between Mongolia and Europe via the Middle East.
The species is not endangered, according to IUCN.
