Summer bird survey along the southern shoreline of the Kola Peninsula, between Varzuga and Pulonga

Abstract

We present summer bird observations from thesouthern shoreline of the Kola Peninsulain Russia, one of the last wilderness areas of the Palearctic region from which very littlebiological data are available. Bird specieswere searched for along the coast betweenVarzuga and Pulonga during 29.6.–2.7.2004, following a west-east gradient (66°N, 37°–39°E). We observed 85 species, 37 of which were lacking from inventories conducted 50years ago. In addition to species rare in for the Murmansk region, we observed 11 speciesthat, according to recent handbooks of Europeanbirds (but not to local Russian literature),are missing from the peninsula. Several of those species have experienced a significant in-crease in Europe over the last decades.