IMPORTANT BIRD AREAS OF SRI LANKA PRESENT STATUS

Abstract

The IBA programme produces inventories of internationally recognized sites,which are vital for conservation of birds. These sites are identified using setof four standard global criteria. These criteria are designed to selectrepresentative areas of most important bird habitats, principally those that areunder the most severe pressure. As birds are the best indicators for overallbiological diversity, most IBAs will be significant for other animals andplants too. The reason for initiating a global IBA programme was obvious asthroughout the world important sites for wildlife conservation are beingdestroyed, polluted or disturbed at an increasing pace. Habitat loss andmodification is the single largest threat to biodiversity. Many threatenedspecies are in fact threatened by the same factors at particular sites.Therefore, site-based conservation measures can conserve many species atthe same time.

First task for the IBA programme was the identification of important birds forfirst three categories i.e. globally threatened species, restricted range speciesand biome restricted species. Ten species of globally threatened species areconsidered for the IBA programme since 14 of 24 globally threatened speciesrecorded from Sri Lanka are vagrants. Twenty-four restricted range speciesincluding newly discovered Serendib scops owl are included in the secondcategory. All nationally threatened species are also included in this category.Nineteen species are listed under biome-restricted species for thisprogramme.

In Sri Lanka, 70 Important Bird Areas have been identified all over theisland. From these IBAs, 47 supports globally threatened species while 56sites facilitate restricted range species. 46 IBAs contained biome restrictedspecies. For bird aggregations, 26 sites have been identified. Four IBAsnamely Yala, Bundala, Gal Oya and Udawalawe are qualified under all fourcategories. 39 sites qualify for three of the four categories. According to thearea of the IBAs, 25 sites are less than lOOOha in size while 27 IBAs arebetween 1000 and 5000ha. This shows the severity of fragmentation of theimportant areas. 71% of the IBAs are located in the South Western part of theisland showing the importance of protecting wet zone forests, which arehighly threatened by human disturbances.