China News Service, Yongzhou, September 22 (Pan Junjie, Duan Yi, Wang Yisong) It is currently a critical period for migratory birds to migrate south in autumn. The Sihaiping Migratory Bird Protection and Monitoring Station in Lanshan County, Yongzhou City, Hunan, located at the junction of Hunan and Guangdong and at the core of the migratory bird migration channel in the Nanling Mountains, officially launched an intelligent radar monitoring system in September this year. 24-hour uninterrupted airspace scanning replaces the traditional manual observation mode, providing a technological "protective umbrella" for transiting migratory birds and ushering the Millennium Nanling Bird Trail into a new stage of smart protection.
Every September to the following spring is an important period for migratory birds to migrate. There are 9 major migratory bird migration corridors in the world, 4 of which pass through China. As the busiest migratory bird migration corridor in the world, the East Asia-Australasia Flyway connects 22 countries and carries about 210 species and more than 50 million migratory birds.
Hunan is a key section of the East Asia-Australasia flyway. Relying on the unique mountain topography and climate conditions, Nanfeng Au in Lanshan County, Yongzhou forms a natural migration corridor for migratory birds. More than 100 species and about 3.5 million migratory birds migrate through this place every year. It is a veritable "Millennium Birdway".
The Sihaiping Migratory Bird Protection and Monitoring Station is located in the Yunbingshan tourist attraction in the Blue Mountains. Relying on the unique geographical and climatic advantages of the Nanling Mountains, it forms a natural wind outlet where the north-south airflow meets, and is the only route for migratory birds in the central region to migrate south. During the autumn and winter migration seasons, a large number of wild migratory birds stop here to find food and supplies before continuing their journey south.
For a long time, local migratory bird protection work has mainly relied on the traditional model of manual patrols and naked-eye observation, which is greatly restricted by objective conditions such as severe weather, complex terrain, and high-altitude dense forests. "It is impossible to observe high-altitude migrating birds in rainy weather, and it is difficult for humans to reach deep mountains, dense forests, and high-altitude areas, and there are a lot of blind spots in observation." Tang Jiahao, a staff member of the Sihaiping Migratory Bird Protection and Monitoring Station, said that in the past, the judgment of migratory bird migration patterns relied mostly on the experience of staff, and there were obvious shortcomings in monitoring accuracy, timeliness, and coverage.
In September this year, the intelligent radar monitoring system was officially put into use, completely filling the shortcomings of traditional management and protection. The system can realize 24-hour uninterrupted all-area airspace scanning, automatically identify and accurately count core data such as population categories, flight altitudes, cluster numbers, migration speeds of passing migratory birds, summarize and update them in real time, and build a dynamic migratory bird migration database; at the same time, the system is connected The dynamic high-definition monitoring and intelligent patrol module records the activity status of migratory birds throughout the process and intelligently analyzes migration trends, effectively filling the monitoring gaps where manual patrols cannot cover high-altitude airspace and deep mountains and dense forests, and promotes the shift of migratory bird monitoring from "empirical judgment" to "accurate data analysis".
In the monitoring station, staff are on duty on the intelligent monitoring platform in real time, checking and sorting out the massive data returned by the radar one by one, accurately recording key information such as the peak migration period of migratory birds, dominant populations, migration flows, and the number of transits in a single day. They also standardize the archiving and dynamically update the data ledger to ensure that the monitoring data is true, complete, and traceable throughout the process. Since the system was put into use, the monitoring station has observed and recorded dozens of species of water birds such as herons, shorebirds, geese and ducks, and various forest birds. During the peak migration period, thousands of passing migratory birds are monitored every day.
"Now, relying on real-time dynamic monitoring data, we can accurately grasp the time nodes, migration peaks, dominant populations, habitat distribution and migration patterns of migratory birds southward, predict migration peaks in advance, and provide scientific data support for accurate patrolling, hidden danger investigation, and habitat management." Tang Jiahao said.
