White storks undertake some of the longest migrations of any large bird, facing welfare threats from power lines, pesticides, hunting along flyways, and the loss of the wetland and grassland habitats they depend on.
Storks face welfare challenges at every stage of their annual cycle. Power line electrocution causes instant death or severe wing injuries from which birds rarely recover in the wild; survivors may be permanently grounded and slowly starve. Pesticide exposure in African wintering grounds depletes insect and small vertebrate prey, forcing storks to expend greater energy searching for food during a period when they need to build reserves for the return migration. Hunting along flyways — legal in some countries — causes traumatic mortality. The sheer distance of annual migration exposes storks to cumulative hazards across dozens of countries with inconsistent protection levels. Even where breeding populations have recovered, the multi-country nature of stork ecology means protection in one jurisdiction can be undone by threats in another.