Some 90% of the territory of a private nature park for rare species of birds was destroyed in a wildfire early on Sunday, the park’s chief said.
The head of the Muravyovsky Park, Sergei Smirensky, said the wildfire was fanned by strong winds.
“We struggled to prevent the fire from spreading to bird enclosures. Good thing the new generation has already grown up and most of them just flew away,” he said. “But next year they will have nowhere to return to.”
The park, Russia’s first non-state nature reserve since 1917, is home to more than 200 types of rare birds, including the red-crowned cranes and oriental storks, both listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.