Raptor populations in Africa are rapidly declining, yet causes of mortality are insufficiently known for most resident species understudied beyond poisoning. This study aimed to investigate the causes of raptor mortality on the African continent. We compiled 1012 mortality records from 43 raptor species tracked with GPS transmitters in Africa between 2003 and 2026 to identify the main causes of mortality, estimate the relative contribution of anthropogenic vs natural causes of mortality, and the factors affecting mortality. Human-induced mortality accounted for 58.8% of known mortality in migratory raptors (n = 233) and 74.3% in non-migratory raptors (n = 241). The main causes of known mortality were direct killing (24.4% of 474 records), poisoning (23.6%), and electrocution (10.1%). Predatory raptors were at higher risk of direct killing than vultures, had higher risk in urbanised than rural landscapes, for non-migrants compared to migrants, and during the non-breeding season compared to the breeding and migration seasons. Vultures had a higher risk of poisoning among adults compared to immatures and in more rural/protected areas relative to urbanised areas. Among poisoned vultures (n = 103), 40.2% were poisoned intentionally. Electrocution occurred at similar rates in vultures and predatory raptors, and more frequently with more urbanisation. The proportion of tracked birds for which cause of mortality could be identified increased over time but remained lower for non-migrants compared to migrants. Our results show the predominantly anthropogenic origin of raptor mortality in Africa, stressing the need for stronger conservation actions directed against direct killing, poisoning, and electrocution.

Zoonotic diseases increasingly threaten human and wildlife populations, driving a global rise in mass-mortality outbreaks, including the ongoing avian influenza panzootic in wildlife and zoonotic spillovers such as the COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic in humans. We introduce a new general framework for detecting and managing pathogen outbreaks using animal movement and sensory biologging data to enhance early outbreak detection, provide near-real-time updates on sentinel host health and mortality, and reveal infection-induced behavioral changes. Integrating past and near-real-time biologging with disease surveillance data also enables prospective assessments of spatiotemporal outbreak dynamics, informs management decisions, helps to mitigate spillover risks, and supports both disease control and wildlife conservation.

Human-induced direct mortality affects huge numbers of birds each year, threatening hundreds of species worldwide. Tracking technologies can be an important tool to investigate temporal and spatial patterns of bird mortality as well as their drivers. We compiled 1704 mortality records from tracking studies across the African-Eurasian flyway for 45 species, including raptors, storks, and cranes, covering the period from 2003 to 2021. Our results show a higher frequency of human-induced causes of mortality than natural causes across taxonomic groups, geographical areas, and age classes. Moreover, we found that the frequency of human-induced mortality remained stable over the study period. From the human-induced mortality events with a known cause (n = 637), three main causes were identified: electrocution (40.5 %), illegal killing (21.7 %), and poisoning (16.3 %). Additionally, combined energy infrastructure-related mortality (i.e., electrocution, power line collision, and wind-farm collision) represented 49 % of all human-induced mortality events. Using a random forest model, the main predictors of human-induced mortality were found to be taxonomic group, geographic location (latitude and longitude), and human footprint index value at the location of mortality. Despite conservation efforts, human drivers of bird mortality in the African-Eurasian flyway do not appear to have declined over the last 15 years for the studied group of species. Results suggest that stronger conservation actions to address these threats across the flyway can reduce their impacts on species. In particular, projected future development of energy infrastructure is a representative example where application of planning, operation, and mitigation measures can enhance bird conservation.

Migration is one of the most physical and energetically demanding periods in an individual bird’s life. The composition of the bird’s gut or cloacal microbiota can temporarily change during migration, likely due to differences in diets, habitats and other environmental conditions experienced en route . However, how physiological condition, migratory patterns, and other drivers interact to affect microbiota composition of migratory birds is still unclear. We sampled the cloacal bacterial microbiota of a long-distance migrant, the steppe buzzard ( Buteo buteo vulpinus ), at an important spring stopover bottleneck in Eilat, Israel, after crossing the ca. 1800 km Sahara Desert. We examined whether diversity and composition of the cloacal microbiota varied with body condition, sex, movement patterns (i.e., arrival time and migration distance), and survival. Early arrival to Eilat was associated with better body condition, longer post-Eilat spring migration distance, higher microbial α-diversity, and differences in microbiota composition. Specifically, early arrivals had higher abundance of the phylum Synergistota and five genera, including Jonquetella and Peptococcus , whereas the phylum Proteobacteria and genus Escherichia-Shigella (as well as three other genera) were more abundant in later arrivals. While the differences in α-diversity and Escherichia-Shigella seem to be mainly driven by body condition, other compositional differences associated with arrival date could be indicators of longer migratory journeys (e.g., pre-fueling at wintering grounds or stopover habitats along the way) or migratory performance. No significant differences were found between the microbiota of surviving and non-surviving individuals. Overall, our results indicate that variation in steppe buzzard microbiota is linked to variation in migratory patterns (i.e., capture/arrival date) and body condition, highlighting the importance of sampling the microbiota of GPS-tracked individuals on multiple occasions along their migration routes to gain a more detailed understanding of the links between migration, microbiota, and health in birds.

Avian influenza viruses (AIV) are a worldwide threat to animal and human health. As wild waterfowl circulate and spread these viruses around the world, investigations of AIV prevalence in wild populations are critical for understanding pathogen transmission, as well as predicting disease outbreaks in domestic animals and humans. Surveillance efforts in this study have isolated H4N6 for the first time in Israel from a faecal sample of a wild mallard (Anas platyrhynchos). Phylogenetic analyses of the HA and NA genes revealed that this strain is closely related to isolates from Europe and Asia. This Eurasian origin, together with Israel serving as an important migratory bottleneck of the mid Palearctic-African flyway, suggests a potential introduction of this strain by migratory birds. Additional phylogenetic analysis of the isolate's internal genes (PB1, PB2, PA, NP, M and NS) revealed high levels of phylogenetic relatedness with other AIV subtypes, indicating previous reassortment events. High reassortment rates are characteristic for H4N6 viruses, which, together with this subtype's ability to infect pigs and adaptability to the human receptor binding domain, raises the concern that it would potentially become zoonotic in the future. These results emphasize the importance of continuous AIV monitoring in migratory birds.