Each spring thousands of migrant birds cross Malta on their way to breeding grounds in Europe, and some of them even choose the UK as the summer home. In Malta, hunting birds is a cultural tradition, and although there are laws in place to govern when shooting can be carried out, a huge amount of protected birds are illegally killed.

Our partners at BirdLife Malta are campaigning and working on the ground to stop illegal…

 [Rob Sheldon, the RSPB's Head of International Species Recovery Team has been in Bangladesh reporting on work to help save the spoon-billed sandpiper]

My visit to Bangladesh has come to and end. It has been hugely satisfying to see the excellent work carried out by our partners in Bangladesh. With the reduction in hunting pressure at Sonadia and the great survey work being undertaken by Sayam and Foysal, it is clear…

Guest post by RSPB staff member and author Conor Mark Jameson. 

The RSPB holds its annual weekend for members at York University each spring during half-term. The students are away and the wildfowl own the campus. Members (and staff and volunteers present) are treated to a range of stimulating talks and activities, guaranteed to recharge the batteries, remind us what multi-tentacled beast we are, grappling with challenges…

[Rob Sheldon, the RSPB's Head of International Species Recovery Team, is out in Bangladesh at the moment - here are his thoughts from the field]

[This is his second post, to see his earlier post, see here]

As I peer into the distance I realize the person who first mooted the difficulties of spotting needles in haystacks may just have been a birder.

 I’m still on Sonadia Island in Bangladesh and I’m accompanying…

[Rob Sheldon, the RSPB's Head of International Species Recovery Team, is out in Bangladesh at the moment - here are his thoughts from the field]

Regular readers of the our Saving Species blog will be aware of the partnership, including the RSPB, that is battling to save the spoon-billed sandpiper from extinction, The bird migrates from its breeding grounds in far-eastern Russia, through the inter-tidal habitats of…

[Ananya Mukherjee provides us with another update on Vulture Safe Zones (VSZs) from India…]

After pushing the advocacy work for the vultures in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, and Lucknow, the Uttar Pradesh Vulture Safe Zone (UP VSZ) became the next stop. Spot-checks on pharmacies, cattle fair visits, and extensive informal conversations with local community people revealed that the vulture cause has a long way to go in this…

[Simon Wotton from our Conservation Science Department tells us about the latest surveys to find Gola malimbe…]

I have been doing fieldwork for the RSPB since 1992, but the toughest few weeks were when two of us went to the Gola Forest in 2006 to survey white-necked picathartes for our sabbatical.  RSPB staff can take a sabbatical every 7 years, so of course I decided I wanted to go back to Gola again!  There were…