Red knots undertake one of the longest migrations on earth and face mounting welfare challenges from climate-driven Arctic breeding failure and loss of key staging and wintering habitat.
Red knots experience welfare challenges distributed across their entire migratory range. In the Arctic, earlier snow melt can desynchronise invertebrate emergence with chick hatching, reducing chick food availability and survival. At critical staging sites, loss of key food resources — particularly horseshoe crab eggs — forces birds to continue migration without adequate fuel, increasing mortality risk. On wintering grounds, habitat loss reduces foraging options. Each stage of the lifecycle is connected: poor fuelling at one stage compounds welfare impacts at the next.