It has not been seen with certainty since 1995 in Morocco despite extensive research carried out since then. Migratory bird, the slender-billed curlew has probably disappeared according to a scientific study published on November 17 in the ornithological journal IBIS which estimates a 96% probability that the species is now extinct. “Never has a continental species of bird been declared extinct in the Western Palearctic, which covers Europe, North Africa and part of Asia,” warns the League for the Protection of Birds (LPO ), evoking “an extremely worrying first”.
A bird with light plumage and a long, thin curved bill, the Slender-billed Curlew was once a very widespread species in the humid areas of Europe and Central Asia. This highly migratory bird nested in Siberia and Finland before wintering on the Mediterranean coasts. But due to habitat loss caused by intensive agriculture and wetland drainage, its population declined rapidly in the 20th century.
Its last report in France dates back to 1968
In France, its last report dates back to February 15, 1968 in Aiguillon Bay in Vendée. And since 1995, no ornithologist has seen any trace of this bird which is on the latest red list of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, classified as critically endangered. “Several expeditions, hundreds of thousands of square kilometers excavated” and in the end, “nothing unfortunately,” declares Alex Bond, chief curator at the Natural History Museum in London, in an article from the British RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of birds).
“It is crucial to properly assess the importance of the alarm signal represented by the extinction of the slender-billed curlew, because it could usher in a long series of macabre events if we do not act,” Allain Bougrain reacted in a press release. Dubourg, president of the LPO.
Morocco
