Capital of Biodiversity

Text by Terry Townshend

The author is a British conservationist living and working in Beijing.

Beijing has recorded more than 510 local bird species,ranking it second among the capitals of G20 countries,trailing only Brasilia.

“What? But there are few birds in Beijing!” When I first moved to China,this was the most common response from Beijing residents when they found out I liked to watch birds.

As someone who has been interested in birds and nature since the age of four,this was disappointing news.However,as I began to explore the city,I quickly realized that this statement wasn’t true.I saw a wide variety of bird species,and in big numbers,far exceeding what I was familiar with in the UK.The reality is that Beijing has recorded more than 510 species of bird,a number that ranks it second among the capitals of G20 countries,behind only Brasilia.

Beijing is located at the heart of a major bird migratory route known as the East Asian-Australasian Flyway.Every spring,billions of birds migrate north to take advantage of the long days and the explosion of insects in the northern summer.It is worth the journey because,thanks to this free “eat as much as you like” buffet,these birds can have more offspring,more quickly,than if they stayed further south.

A wedge of swan geese in Yanqing District,Beijing.

An illustration shows Eastern buzzards flying over downtown Beijing.

But,of course,conditions change dramatically in winter.The days shorten,temperatures plummet,and insects become hard to find,so the vast majority of these birds must move south to find shelter and food.Some spend the winter in Beijing,some go to southern China,some to Southeast Asia and some as far as Australia and New Zealand.Incredibly,in the case of the Beijing swift,the Beijing cuckoo and the Amur falcon,some go to southern Africa.And,of course,in spring the cycle begins again with billions of birds heading back north.

Spring and autumn are like rush hour on the bird expressway.Some people might say,“If there are billions of birds flying north each spring,why don’t I see the sky full of birds over Beijing?” The answer is that around 80 percent of migratory birds travel at night.

To gain an insight into the nocturnal bird migration over Beijing,an innovative new project began in autumn 2021.In partnership with Peking University,a simple digital sound recorder was placed on the roof of the headquarters of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank(AIIB),located close to the Olympic Park,and programmed to record from sunset to sunrise each night throughout the autumn migration season.

From late August to early November,the recorder captured more than 34,000 calls involving more than 100 species.If one considers that the range of the recorder is just a few hundred meters,depending on the volume of the call,it can be estimated that,if recorders were spread right across Beijing from east to west and the concentration of bird migration was uniform across the city,the total number of calls recorded over the city would be around eight million in one season.

Interestingly,the three most common species recorded were:first,the olive-backed pipit,a woodland bird;second,the blackcrowned night heron,a wetland bird;and third,the Eurasian skylark,a grassland bird.This demonstrates the diversity of species flying over Beijing and also the diversity of habitats they require.

The incredible volume and richness of migratory birds that can be found in Beijing is complemented by a wealth of other wildlife.The city is one of the very few major capital cities to host wild cats—the city’s scrublands and grasslands are home to leopard cats—and an impressive collection of butterflies and dragonflies (many more than all of the UK),reptiles,amphibians,and plants.

An illustration depicts common Beijing swifts flying over the Temple of Heaven.

The author,Terry Townshend (right),releases a Beijing swift fitted with a geolocator at the Summer Palace.

In 2022,under China’s presidency of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity,more than 190 countries agreed to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) to slow,stop,and reverse biodiversity loss.This is a vital step that recognizes the scale of the issue and identifies a series of targets to guide implementation.

As the capital city of the country that presided over the new biodiversity agreement,Beijing has a wonderful opportunity to lead the way by demonstrating how a modern city can align with the goals of the GBF.

Given the diversity of species and their diverse habitat requirements (as illustrated by the study from the rooftop of the AIIB headquarters),this means allocating dedicated areas with a balance of trees,grasslands and wetlands as natural habitats for migratory birds.Observations from citizen science birders in Beijing,backed by growing scientific evidence,show that wild areas that are not heavily managed and with limited human disturbance provide much better habitats for migratory birds.

Beijing,and indeed many other Chinese cities,are planning to create more urban green spaces over the next few years.Wonderful opportunities are emerging to integrate some relatively wild,unmanaged areas in the design of new parks and to retrofit existing parks to support migratory birds.In addition,exploring the potential to switch off unnecessary lights at night and shield lighting to ensure it is focused where it is needed—on the ground—and not up into space,especially during the spring and autumn migration seasons.Light pollution is known to disorientate birds,exhausting them and causing them to alight in urban areas,where they face a number of unnatural threats including collisions with reflective glass.

With the vast majority of bird species recorded in Beijing being migratory,the city has a duty to do what it can to provide safe passage.This is especially important in the context of global biodiversity loss.By taking further steps to integrate biodiversity goals including the needs of migratory birds into its urban planning,Beijing could become the first major city to align with the GBF,providing strong global leadership and improving its image to become a “Capital of Biodiversity.”