Migratory shorebirds travel tens of thousands of kilometers annually and depend on a chain of critical stopover sites that are disappearing rapidly.
Migratory shorebirds arriving at depleted stopover sites face starvation and exhaustion. Birds unable to refuel adequately cannot complete migrations to breeding grounds. Emaciated birds arriving late miss peak breeding conditions. Energy deficit cascades through generations as weakened adults produce fewer successful offspring. The destruction of stopover habitat condemns millions of individual birds to prolonged starvation and exhausted death annually. This welfare crisis directly results from coastal development and overharvesting of horseshoe crabs.