BirdLife to organise first Bird Migration Festival

BirdLife Malta is holding the first edition of Bird Migration Festival in Buskett on Saturday afternoon.

The event is being organised as part of Europe's largest public birdwatching event, EuroBirdwatch.

BirdLife invited members of the public to join in an afternoon of bird and nature related activities, including raptor watching, scientific bird ringing, children's games, a prize Treasure Hunt around the historic woodland garden, food stalls and competitions.

Richard Cachia-Zammit, one of the events organizers, said he was looking forward to being able to introduce people to the pleasure of Birdwatching,

"There are many more bird species found in Malta than most people know about, let alones see. And some of them are quite spectacular to watch. The idea of EuroBirdwatch is to introduce more people to these birds to help raise awareness and support for their conservation."

Every autumn millions of migrating birds leave Europe and fly to their wintering grounds in Africa, traveling thousands of kilometres and overcoming many dangers and obstacles along their flyways.

Malta's position on the Central Mediterranean Migratory Flyway makes it a vital stopover for many migrating birds, particularly birds of prey, on their way from Europe to Africa for the winter.

For 20 years, BirdLife International's European partners have been celebrating this annual natural spectacle by coordinating activities across Europe to raise awareness, engage and inspire people about migrating birds and conservation.

Buskett Gardens, located in the south-west of Malta, is a historic woodland garden in the valley below Verdala Palace, and is one of the most important sites in the Maltese Island for migrating birds of prey, as well as other migrating and resident woodland birds. It is a Bird Sanctuary and a Natura 2000 protected site.

In the autumn, birds flying south to Africa fly across the Maltese Islands reaching the south-west coastal cliffs in the Buskett-Dingli area.

In the afternoon, many birds of prey and other soaring birds, like storks and herons, look for places to roost for the night, rather than starting out on the long flight across the sea.

The trees in Buskett valley offer the perfect roosting place for these birds and are often filled with hundreds of Honey Buzzards, Hobbies and other protected migrating birds, including rare species like Pallid Harriers.

The Buskett Bird Migration Festival will celebrate the autumn bird migration and give members of public of all ages the chance to see, enjoy and appreciate the spectacle of Malta's migrating birds, and show them why we work so hard to protect them.

EuroBirdwatch is the biggest birdwatching event in Europe, with 34 different countries and around 70,000 people participating last year, recording more than six million birds in a single weekend! Every year hundreds of nationally organized activities help bring people closer to nature and further our scientific understanding of European birds so that we can ensure their future survival in a rapidly changing world.