Photos from inside North Korea reveal how the ecology of the secretive Asian country is preventing the extinction of several once plentiful species of migratory birds. 북한 내부에서 찍은 사진들은 북한의 생태가 어떻게 한 때 다수였던여러 종의 철새들의 멸종이 발생하지 않는가 잘 보여주고 있다.
Despite being closed to most foreigner visitors, North Korea may ironically be the saviour of one of the world's greatest international migration routes - the avian East Asian Australasian Flyway. 북한은 세계에서 가장 큰 철새 이동의 보호지.
Fifty million birds, from cranes to song birds, journey along the Flyway twice a year. Eight million of those are shorebirds - or waders. 학(두루미)부터 노래하는 새들에 이르기까지 5천만 새들은 매년 두 차례 비행한다. 그 중 8백만이 물떼새들(혹은 涉禽類섭금류)이다.
And for many thousands of those, North Korea's west coast - on the Yellow Sea - is their sole stop-off point. 이들 중 많은 수는 북한의 서해안 황해가 바로 그들의 유일하게 머물렀다 가는 곳이다.
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In tidal mudflats, species such as the bar-tailed godwit - the larger birds in the photo above - refuel on worms and molluscs. 위 사진에 보이는 큰 새들(큰뒷부리도요)와 같은 種들은 갯벌에서 벌레와 연체동물을 잡아 먹는다. (molluscs [|mɑ:ləsk] 연체동물) (refuel on: 이동간 재급유, 이동 중에 먹이를 취한다)
And the endangered great knots - spotted below - search for small clams. 붉은가슴도요는 조개를 찾는다.
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These photos were taken by a group of New Zealand birders with permission from North Korea's security-conscious government. 이 사진들은 북한당국의 허락을 얻어 뉴질랜드 조류관찰자들이 찍은 것이다.
With their binoculars, powerful telescopes and cameras, they counted the birds as they stopped off on their epic journeys from the southern hemisphere to the top of the northern hemisphere.
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The Kiwi birders belong to a conservation NGO in New Zealand - the Pukorokoro Miranda Naturalists' Trust.
"As we lose habitat elsewhere, the birds are going to get more and more pushed into remaining habitat, which by default means North Korea," says the group's David Melville - pictured below on the left.
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North Korea's coast is considered so important because the shorelines of neighbouring nations - China and South Korea - have witnessed rapid and large-scale reclamation projects.
Mudflats have been converted to dry land for agriculture and industrial development.
Of the total area of Yellow Sea mudflat habitat which existed 50 years ago, only one third remains - according to shorebird ecology expert Richard Fuller of the University of Queensland, Australia.
He also says that the Flyway's largest shorebird, the Far Eastern curlew - spotted below - has declined in number by more than 80% in 50 years.
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The Kiwi birders spent 10 days in Mundok county, on North Korea's west coast.
They visited not only tidal mudflats where the birds feed - but also salt works and rice paddies, where the creatures rest and roost.
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"The security forces needed to be informed that foreigners were coming to look at birds," says Melville.
"But we were able to show local people shorebirds through our telescopes. We even found birds which had flown from New Zealand which I had personally banded."
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North Korea's lack of development - compared to China and South Korea - means the country's mudflats are largely intact.
But the conservationists say the birds also benefit from there being fewer river-polluting factories, and lower levels of agricultural fertilisers and pesticides running off the land into the marine environment.
The expansive mudflats - pictured next - are rich in molluscs, marine worms and crustaceans on which the shorebirds depend for food.
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During the trip, the New Zealand birders say they identified several new sites of international importance for the bar-tailed godwit, the Eurasian curlew, and the critically endangered Eastern curlew.
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The shorebirds spend about one month in the spring - and about three months in the autumn - gorging on invertebrates hidden in the mud.
But one subspecies of the bar-tailed godwit is exceptional - as it only stops in North Korea and elsewhere around the Yellow Sea on its way north.
In the autumn, it completes an eight- or nine-day journey of almost 12,000km in one go. No other bird in the world makes such an epic non-stop flight.
ADRIAN RIEGEN
ADRIAN RIEGEN
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ADRIAN RIEGEN
ADRIAN RIEGEN
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