Source: People's Daily - Yunnan Channel Original draft
Baoshan, October 12, People's Network Since the end of September, Changning County, Baoshan City, has visited the city from time to time, especially before and after the National Day, birdwatchers have observed and recorded gray-headed wheat chickens around Changning County for many times, with an overall number of nearly a thousand. This is the second observation and recording of large-scale gray-headed wheat chicken flocks in Changning County in recent years. The previous one was on February 29, 2020.
The grey-headed wheat chicken is a medium-sized water bird of the family Plover family and the wheat chicken genus. It is found in Eurasia and northern Africa, the Indochina Peninsula, and the Pacific Islands. China breeds in the northeast region and Jiangsu and Fujian, and winters in Guangdong and Yunnan.
Grey-headed wheat chickens prefer to move in open areas near the water, fly slowly, and often move in large groups, small groups, and pairs. He likes to rest on the semi-naked grass and fields by the water for a long time, flying into the air from time to time, circling and flying for a while before falling. It feeds mainly on beetles, locusts, grasshoppers, Coleoptera and Orthoptera, but also eats leeches, snails, earthworms, mollusks and plant leaves and seeds.
It is reported that the gray-headed wheat chicken has been included in the "Red List of Vertebrates of China" (Jiang Zhigang et al., 2016) as a non-threatened (LC) species, the IUCN Red List of low-risk (LC) species, the global near-threatened (Collar et al. (.1994) species, and the "List of Beneficial or Economically Important Economic and Scientific Research Value of National Protection" as a "List of Terrestrial Wild Animals Protected by the State". The status of the population is: the number of population status research and protection is small, uncommon, has been listed in the N level of the world list of endangered birds, and should pay attention to conservation. (Zeng Zhizhi, Wu Zaizhong)