History of Bird Studies in the Volgograd Region

Abstract

Bird studies have been conducted in the area of Volgograd oblast since the second half of the eighteenth century. The first studies were conducted by the heads of large academic expeditions: S.G. Gmelin (1771, 1777), I.I. Lepekhin (1771, 1795), and P.S. Pallas (1788). Therefore, this period of studies can be called the “academic period.” In the middle of the nineteenth century, professors, masters, and undergraduate and graduate students of large Russian universities (Eversmann, Artzibascheff, Bogdanov, Yakovlev, Khlebnikov, and Bostanzhoglo) started to study the bird fauna of the Volga region, and this second period of studies can be called the “university period.” In addition, a great amount of data on the birds of the Lower Volga region had also been published by German taxidermists (together with zoologists) who were gathering bird collections for sale to European museums (Moeschler, Badeker, Rikbeyl, Henсke, Pelzam, Loretz, et al.). In the first half of the twentieth century, the majority of studies on bird fauna in the Lower Volga region were scientific and practical and were aimed at the organization of their use and protection. In addition to planned studies performed by specialists, important data on bird fauna were collected by amateur ornithologists who came to the Lower Volga region accidently (Kracht, Vietinghoff, Torne, and Bub). In the second half of the twentieth century, active ecological and geographical research was initiated by the staff of the Volgograd Pedagogical Institute, who studied the parasites of birds of prey and corvids, the urban bird population, and the birds of fish ponds. At the end of the twentieth century, a number of studies were conducted in the Lower Volga region within the Important Bird Areas of Russia program supported by foreign grants. These works were followed by a large series of publications; unfortunately, these publications contained little significant ecological and faunistic information.