Status and distribution of the endangered Baer's Pochard Aythya baeri in Bangladesh

Continued declines in the now endangered Baer's Pochard Aythya baeri imply that this species may well be entering a downward spiral towards global extinction. Knowledge of the drivers of this decline remain fairly anecdotal and even basic data on population trends are hard to come by given the species's similarity to other diving ducks. We conducted a review of past records of Baer's Pochard in Bangladesh, given concerns over the reliability of some past counts, to determine the true magnitude of recent declines, and also present counts from targeted surveys in Bangladesh in the 2010-2011 winter in addition to some basic autecological data. We conclude that several of the high counts from the period 1990-2005 may have been in error, but even accounting for these, the population has declined nationally by 99% in just two decades.