Thiruvananthapuram: Sivakumar could remember a time when there were 200 species of birds in Akkulam. But those were days when pollution was not so bad.
Today, he is happy to see conditions have changed and once again a number of bird species, around 25 of them, are found here. A senior education officer at WWF-India, he had gone as part of the Asian Water Bird Census 2017 conducted in Thiruvananthapuram with the support of the Social Forestry Wing of Kerala Forests and Wildlife Department.
“It suggests lesser pollution,” says Sivakumar. It was not just Akkulam. They went to nine sites, including Punchakkari, Aruvikkara, and wetlands within the city. The census revealed a considerable hike in the number of species and individual count of birds. They counted 4442 birds belonging to 77 species including 27 migratory, compared to 2431 birds from 49 species last year.
The highest count came from the wetlands in and around Kadinamkulam. “But then it is a concern that most of the newly recorded species are dry habituated ones, indicating climate change – increasing dryness in our area,” Sivakumar says. The teams are also worried over the habitat loss and degradation at each site.
