(Posted on behalf of Geoff Welch - International Management Plans Adviser. Geoff works in the RSPB's Partner Development Unit (Africa, Asia and UK Overseas Territories)
And so I have come to Uzbekistan, because....
For most people, Uzbekistan summons up images of camel caravans, the Silk Road and the famous cities of Bukhara and Samarkand but it is also an important country for birds and biodiversity. Fifty-one Important Bird Areas (IBAs) have so far been identified but the majority lack formal protection, however all need some degree of management to maintain their conservation importance and many provide important resources for local communities. The local BirdLife International Affiliate, UzSPB (the Uzbekistan Society for the Protection of Birds), and the RSPB are working together to develop a way of preparing simple management plans (termed Site Action Plans) that can be developed and implemented by local bird clubs and communities. Three pilot sites have been selected covering the main habitats of Uzbekistan and it is hoped that these will become demonstration sites for developing plans for all of the country’s IBAs in due course.
Ayakaghitma - great lake, terrible journey - 3 June
After a 10 hour overnight train ride from Tashkent to Bukhara and a day’s planning with the local university bird club leader, Mukhtar Turaev, we set off just after breakfast for Ayakaghitma, a man-made lake in the southern part of the Kyzylkum desert, in a trusty, if somewhat basic, Russian four wheel drive minibus which in the heat of Uzbekistan’s summer and on the rough tracks also doubled as a sauna and roller-coaster!
My companions were Roman Kashkarov (Chief Executive of UzSPB), his son Oleg (Public Relations and Awareness-raising Assistant), Alisher Atakhodjaev (Education and Nature Protection Coordinator) and Mukhtar, together with Rashid Rakhmonov (Mukhtar’s assistant in the Department of Ecology at Bukhara University and working with Mukhtar on the action plan) and Professor Savridin Bakaev (recently retired from the university and one of the region’s leading ornithologists).
Our first view of the lake was from the hills bordering the depression in which it lies and its blue waters looked extremely welcoming. The lake is bordered by extensive areas of salt steppe with scattered patches of tamarisk and reed and, beyond the hills, desert and low dunes with a sparse cover of saxaul trees. The site qualifies as an IBA for its combination of breeding and passage waterbirds, breeding Egyptian vultures and desert bird community. This was my second visit to the site, the previous being in spring 2008 as a member of a small team searching, unsuccessfully, for migrating slender-billed curlews.
We had arranged to meet with community representatives from Ayakaghitma village which is located on the northern shore of the lake to introduce the idea of preparing a Site Action Plan, find out from the locals what they considered to be important about the area and discuss ways in which we could work together to tackle issues that affect conservation and local livelihoods. The village is relatively isolated and so the inhabitants rely on the lake and desert for their livelihoods.
While we waited in the shade of the trees around the school for people to arrive, I took the opportunity to have a quick look at a small pool in the middle of the village where livestock come to drink. Several crested larks, like skylarks with punk haircuts, lay prone on the cool damp mud, a pair of black-headed wagtails and a pair of masked wagtails were busily catching insects along the margin and a Kentish plover was running around like a clockwork toy. Masked wagtails, which are the logo of UzSPB, put ‘our’ pied wagtails to shame having a striking black balaclava hood, white eye patch and large white wing patches. As a further reminder that this was somewhere rather special and exotic on the telephone wire overhead was a hoopoe and two blue-cheeked bee-eaters, the latter bright emerald green with black lines through their eyes, sky blue eyebrows and cheeks, yellow chins and warm brown throats. Then a stunning male citrine wagtail suddenly appeared, resplendent with a sulphur yellow head and underparts, black collar and grey back.
By now everyone had assembled – one of the teachers, the director of the school, several village elders, the Inspector from the State Biological Control Unit in Shafrikan and a Ranger from the regional association of hunters and fishermen who lives in the village – and the meeting was able to begin.
The importance of local resources for the villagers was highlighted by their list of what they considered important – fish from the lake, birds and animals for small scale subsistence hunting, livestock grazing of the sparse desert vegetation, hot mineral springs, a small gypsum quarry, and the collection of medicinal plants and saxaul for firewood and cooking. Although summer temperatures regularly exceed 40◦C, in winter temperatures drop to around 0◦C and the lake freezes occasionally – hard to believe while I sat at the back of the meeting with the sweat dripping off me! The list of issues concerning the villagers included a lack of employment opportunities for the younger generation, very basic facilities including no freshwater in the village itself, it is all shipped in by tanker from neighbouring villages, illegal hunting and fishing, and declining amounts of saxaul largely due to illegal commercial collection by people from nearby towns. While it will be impractical for the Site Action Plan to address all of these, we felt that we could assist with tackling the illegal hunting issue and look at ways of managing the saxaul sustainably – if successful both will benefit the key wildlife of the area as well. We might also be able to advise on marketing of the medicinal plants and, longer term, possibly the development of small scale birdwatching tourism.
Traditional plov feast
To mark the start of a hopefully successful partnership, the meeting concluded with a traditional meal of plov – rice, carrots and lamb – accompanied by copious amounts of green tea and vodka! Matching the temperature outside, I was treated to the characteristic warm and generous hospitality typical of Central Asia and being the only foreigner present, I was given pride of place at the head of the table. Finding a polite way of declining the large amounts of food and alcohol thrust upon me took a fair amount of diplomacy but I managed to get away with my waistline and liver largely intact!
On our way back to Bukhara, we visited a private fishing enterprise on the eastern shore of the lake which is experimenting with rearing and introducing fish fry to the lake to boost stocks. The owner of the enterprise told us he was interested in birds and he will be an important ally if we can convince him to be part of the action planning team. He told us that he stops his staff hunting and this appeared to be true when we found a nearby bay with a small mixed flock of greater flamingos, great white pelicans and red-crested pochard which although obviously wary of our presence didn’t fly off, a sure sign that they are not disturbed on a regular basis. Just as we were about to leave two Caspian terns – looking like mean common terns that grew up thinking they are herring gulls! – flew in and were then joined by four white-tailed plovers with striking black and white patterned wings and long trailing chrome yellow legs. A great way to leave a great place which set me up for the two hours of bouncing around in the minibus before we got back to Bukhara!