The Big Bird Race 2007 Results The Professionals Team Won the Race with 162 Species Recorded

The Big Bird Race 2007, organised by WWF on 23-24 March 2007, reached a climax on Saturday night after an exciting 24-hour bird-spotting challenge around the Hong Kong territory.

The winning team was the The Professionals recording 162 species of birds. The second place in the Race went to the Swire Birdbrains with 160 bird species recorded and the third place went to the Jebsen Holidays Wandering Tattlers at 157 species . The total number of bird species spotted this year was 221, 4 species more than last year . The winning team of last year was The Professionals recording 159 species of birds.

The Professionals won the Most Funds Raised Award and the Pentax Cup (for the highest number of individual sponsors) went to Baptist Wing Lung Secondary School. The Cooper's Crippler prize (The Bird of the Day Award) for the rarest or most unusual bird seen during the Race went to the Lee Hysan Sparrows who spotted a Speckled Piculet, at Ng Tung Chai. This is a small woodland bird, and was only the third record for Hong Kong. It had been present at the same site during the last few months but was only seen by one team during the Bird Race.

This year, to promote birdwatching activity to the general public in particular the young generations, we added a new element to the Big Bird Race by running the 1 st Mini Bird Race on 11 March 2007. A total of 11 teams from 3 sections joined the 4-hour race at Mai Po Nature Reserve. The Most Birds Seen Award for the Junior Group, Youth Group and Open Group went to C. & M.A. Chui Chak Lam Memorial School, Ensbulbul and The Kingfishers respectively. The final scores ranged from 35 to 77 species, which was very good considering many teams had only just started to learn about birdwatching. The total number of bird species spotted by all teams was 100. Baptist Wing Lung Secondary School Team A won the Bird of the Day Award for having spotted Great Bittern.

The Big Bird Race, inaugurated in 1984, aimed to raise funds for the establishment of Mai Po Nature Reserve. Since then, it has become WWF’s main annual event to raise funds for the management and conservation of the Mai Po Nature Reserve, as well as enhance public awareness on Hong Kong’s rich biodiversity.