130925-studie-wildlife-comeback-in-europe

West European flyway is used by birds from
northern (Scandinavia) and central (Germany,
Poland etc.) Europe, as well as a proportion of
birds from Finland and the Baltic countries,
which migrate to wintering grounds mainly in
France and the Iberian Peninsula, with some birds
wintering in Morocco [6] . The Baltic-Hungarian
flyway is used by birds mainly from the Baltic
countries and Finland [6] . Eastern Hungary are key
stopover areas used by Baltic-Hungarian cranes,
which go on to winter in North Africa [6] . The
Russian-Ukrainian flyway is used by birds from
the European part of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus,
which winter in Turkey, the Middle East and East
Africa [6] .
Habitat preferences
The Common crane nests in bogs, sedge meadows
and other boreal and temperate forest wetlands [6] .
In the last few decades, they have adapted to utilise
intensively farmed areas [6, 7] . During migration,
they forage in fields, pastures and meadows and
roost in wetland habitats, including shallow lakes
and ponds, rivers, and along the edges of reservoirs
[1] . Winter feeding and roosting habitats vary
across the wintering range, and include shallow
wetlands, newly seeded and stubble grain and
maize fields and, in Iberia, open oak woodlands [1, 5] .
Common cranes are omnivorous and feed on plant
material, such as berries, seeds and cereals, as well
as invertebrates and occasionally take amphibians
and reptiles [2, 4] .
Legal protection and conservation status
The Common crane is listed in Appendix II of
CITES, Annex I of the EU Birds Directive, Annex
II of the Bern Convention and Annex II of the
Convention on Migratory Species, under which
the three flyway populations found in Europe
are covered by the African-Eurasian Waterbird
Agreement (AEWA). In the AEWA Action Plan, the
West European population is listed in Column C
(category 1), the Baltic-Hungarian population is
listed in Column B (category 1), and the Russian-
Ukrainian population is listed in Column A
(category 3c) [8] .
Scale Status Justification
Global
Least Concern
(since 1988)
Extremely large range, very large population size
and although the population trend is unknown, it
is not believed to be declining sufficiently rapidly
to approach the threshold for Threatened.
Europe Depleted (SPEC 2) Moderate historical decline.
EU25
Depleted
The increase is evident in the breeding as well
as the wintering population. For example, since
the 1960s the breeding population in Germany
increased from an estimated