It is over 50 years ago that Falsterbo Bird Observatory was inaugurated. The emphasis during the first decades was on ringing (banding) and took place mainly in the lighthouse garden, close to Falsterbo peninsula’s south-western tip, Nabben. Nowadays breeding censuses and counts of both migrating and resting birds are the pillars of Falsterbo Bird Observatory’s activities. 

Due to its isolated position between sea, golf courses and more urban areas, the lighthouse garden attracts small migrant birds in the morning. They have migrated during the night and seek shelter for feeding and resting before picking up the next leg of their arduous flight. They are trapped in specially designed nets, quickly handled and ringed by the ringers and then released. The original purpose of ringing was not just to determine the routes and winter hideouts of migrant birds but also to find out more about their longevity and causes of death.

Standardised trapping of resting birds in the lighthouse garden has been carried out since 1980. This entails that the 25,000 birds that are ringed annually do not only shed light on the mysteries of bird migration but that their data can also be used for monitoring the environment. Birds react quickly to environmental changes such as variation in climate and pollution in nature. Yearly fluctuations indicate how the environment changes, for better or worse. Consequently, ringing is an important monitoring tool.

Falsterbo Bird Observatory has a close cooperation with scientists at the Department of Zoology at the University of Lund. Radar studies of migration and studies of orientation are currently taking place.

But the observatory is also involved in more practical conservation work. One example of this is the safeguarding of the breeding sites of Avocets in the Flommen reserve.  Another increasingly important function is promoting awareness among the public, and thousands of people are guided each year. Important target groups are children, but also organisations, societies and others experience their first close encounters with birds at Falsterbo Bird Observatory. They also gain deeper insights into bird migration, the activities of the observatory, the ecologic dependencies and current environmental issues.