Observations on migratory birds in Tigris Valley in Türkiye’s southeastern Diyarbakır have proven that international warming has altered the millennia-old seasonal habits of storks.
Anatolian lands, positioned on the migration path to Africa, Europe and Asia for a lot of chicken species, have been the everlasting habitat of storks because of the improve in winter temperatures related to local weather change and international warming, in accordance with a current report by Anadolu Agency (AA).
Storks are one of many many species of birds that migrate by means of Africa, Asia and Anatolia every year, stopping to relaxation or breed in Tigris Valley.
In current durations, the valley has hosted massive stork colonies for longer durations, whereas a rise within the variety of chicks in stork nests was additionally noticed.
Dicle University biology professor Ahmet Kılıç, who has been learning the species within the Tigris Valley for over 20 years, advised AA that storks, thought-about “summer migrants” in Anatolia, migrate towards the Nile Valley in autumn.
Reiterating that they’ve been monitoring migratory birds since 2002, he mentioned, “Storks have gradually stopped migrating.”
“At the start, it was only a few. Later, it spread, and it was observed in December 2023 that over 100 are staying in this region.”
“This staying can be called adaptation because the cold weather that used to cause storks to migrate is no longer an issue,” he mentioned.
“They can find food in this region even in winter, so the stork does not migrate. It was determined that more than 100 storks live here this way,” he mentioned.
Stating that the habits encoded within the genetic construction of migratory birds have now modified, Kılıç talked about that storks used to traverse a distance of some 5,000 kilometers (over 3,000 miles).
Kılıç, expressing that the migration journey is sort of arduous, mentioned that storks not endure this hardship.
“There has been a change in their instincts. Storks are now staying in our region and are considered a native species. Therefore, the instinctive behavior of migration will change,” he famous.
“Their feeding habits will change as they settle for what they find here. The nesting period will change. These changes will also affect the choice of nesting sites and the beginning of incubation,” the professor concluded.
Source: www.dailysabah.com
