International Waterbird Census

Country count totals by species for the period 2019 - 2023

The table below provides summaries of counts from the International Waterbird Census (IWC) between 2019-2023. The table shows count totals grouped by species and you can use the filters to display totals for specific countries or regions. As a default setting, waterbird counts from January are displayed. This is the main month for the IWC. However for various reasons many countries extend the IWC counts into December and February or carry out special counts in other months. To show all counts across the IWC season or from other seasons, please select these relevant months in the filter as well.

Data from the Neotropical Waterbird Census (CNAA) between 1990 and 2012 have been summarised in a separate excel sheet, which can be downloaded here.

In order to support the monitoring of changes in the numbers of introduced species, this report also includes records of species that are not native to the country, i.e. vagrants, escapes or feral individuals of introduced species. National IWC coordinators are kindly requested to notify Wetlands International if any of these records are the result of erroneous data entry.

Please note that the numbers in this report are totals counted per country, which are always less than actual annual national totals and may still be incomplete. The numbers must not also be interpreted as representative of the waterbird trends in a country, as coverage may vary in different years or some data may not have been submitted to national coordinators for more recent years. The sole purpose of this report is to provide feedback to the IWC network and other stakeholders. Wetlands International does not permit quoting the data presented in the table below and takes no responsibility for its accuracy or completeness. For official national count totals or species estimates for scientific or policy purposes, please contact the relevant national coordinator(s).

This report follows the latest taxonomy produced by HBW and BirdLife International. Full details are available from the Birdlife website. Subspecies information has been included where possible. Reporting of subspecies differs between countries, so these entries should be interpreted with some caution. For more information please contact us or the relevant National Coordinators.

We would like to extend our gratitude and sincere thanks to all national coordinators that have shared this valuable information and the many thousands of individuals around the world that have contributed to the collection of these counts.