TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Kaohsiung's Chengcing Lake (澄清湖), a popular tourist attraction near the suburban Fengshan District, was once an important habitat for waterfowl like ducks and geese.
Over the past 30 years, however, there has virtually been no trace of waterfowl at the lake. On Sunday afternoon (Jan. 7), birdwatchers were surprised to see Eurasian teal ducks and northern shoveler ducks in the lake, per CNA.
According to a Kaohsiung Wild Bird Society press release on Monday (Jan. 8), Chengcing Lake was a waterfowl habitat beginning in 1960 with the population growing to thousands in 1985. But by 1994, only a few geese and ducks visited the area before abandoning the lake.
Birdwatchers spotted the teal ducks at the lake’s mudflats near the Deyue Building where they were seen foraging for food and resting. Typically, Taiwan Water Corporation’s Seventh District Management Office clears silt and sand from the lake from December to February, when migratory waterfowl winter in Taiwan.
Birdwatchers recommend silt removal work be postponed or scaled back to maintain the shallow areas of the lake used by waterfowl such as geese, ducks, snipes, and plovers.
More than 40 species of geese and ducks can be regularly seen in the wild in Taiwan. Many such waterfowl are migratory, though mandarin ducks and spot-billed ducks are endemic and breed in Taiwan.
Waterfowl typically travel in groups to forage for food, and their habitats are mostly undisturbed lakes and shore areas. With waterfowl beginning to return, many are hoping this will be an incentive for relevant authorities to undertake better natural resource management allowing Chengcing Lake to return as an important waterfowl habitat.
