Champions of the Flyway Bird Race funds BCG
We are pleased to inform you that BirdLife and SPNI have selected Bird Conservation Georgia as the first recipient of funding generated by the Champions of the Flyway Bird Race to support our conservation work!
The support raised through the bird race will be targeted to our projects on raising awareness among the local communities around Batumi about the incredible migration of raptors, their ecology and vulnerability. Receptive local hunters and falconers will be engaged as ‘ambassadors for conservation’, to raise awareness among their peers of the consequence of their current actions and the significant ecotourism opportunities that a change of attitude and behaviour presents.
The more money raised, the more we can achieve!
For the occasion, Ingeborg Jacobs created this wonderful trailer:
Check out the Champions-of-the-flyway 'cause'-page and learn how you can support this race.
Disney Conservation Grant for BRC
Batumi Raptor Count (BRC) has been awarded a $23,400 grant from the Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund (DWCF). The conservation grant recognizes BRC’s efforts to protect migratory birds of prey at the globally important Batumi bottleneck. This approval was facilitated by our U.S. based partner, Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association.
“We feel grateful and honored to receive significant support from the Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund. This funding will allow us to take a major step forward in our conservation work at Batumi, and will consolidate the great achievements made by our volunteers since the start of the counts in 2008,” said Brecht Verhelst, Treasurer of BRC.
BRC has developed an innovative approach to community-based conservation of migratory raptors, based on involvement of local people, ecotourism and education. DWCF’s support will be used to conduct research into the effectiveness of these programs in reducing the threat of illegal hunting, and to support on-going activities.
The Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund works to protect species and habitats, and connect kids to nature to help develop lifelong conservation values. Since its founding in 1995, DWCF has supported more than 1,000 conservation programs in 112 countries.
EU Youth In Action supports youth project at BRC!
Dear BRC enthusiasts,
we are happy to announce that the European Commission Youth in Action program approved 12.500 EUR support to a youth project implemented at Batumi Raptor Count in 2013.
Our Birds and Biodiversity Camp is one of two youth projects at BRC in 2013 which aims to bring together young people from the Caucasus and western Europe with a passion for nature and environmental conservation. During two weeks of engaging activities including many field trips and outdoor activities the participants will learn about the rich biodiversity of the eastern Black Sea coast, and especially about the bird populations that migrate through the area. We will work together as a group to reflect on the importance of the Black Sea coast for international bird populations and from there on the responsibility of conservationists to take action across countries in a coordinated fashion. We will go out and explore the means that are available to conservationists to implement activities, study how Batumi Raptor Count works through community-based approaches to conservation. Finally, every participant will be able to explore further particular avenues of direct interest to him/her by teaming up in small international groups, each organizing a separate activity which may range from field observations of a particular bird to organizing an educational activity about nature or interviewing Georgian citizens about their relation to nature or birds.
We hope that by following in the wake of migratory birds we can truly make a bridge across national and cultural borders between conservationists. Only by thinking globally can we organize meaningful local activities. Collaborating across borders is an essential component of such an approach, and therefore throughout this project we will conduct several cultural activities including culinary evenings and visits to cultural heritage in the vicinity of Batumi.
This project is organized in collaboration with young and dedicated nature enthusiasts from JNM (Belgium), Young Biologists Association (Armenia) and Kuzeydoga (Turkey).