News

We are very sad to report the death of the International Wader Study Group’s founding father, Dr Clive Minton, in a car accident in Victoria, Australia, on 6 November 2019. Clive was returning home after a trip to see birds on Kangaroo Island in South Australia along with his wife, Pat, and another lady, Erma. Both ladies were badly injured and are now recovering in hospital. Our thoughts are very much with Pat and Erma and their families at this difficult and sad time. Clive Minton’s infectious enthusiasm for waders, his boundless energy, his cannon-netting expertise, his friendship and his charisma touched the lives of a great many people all over the world. He will be sorely missed. Very soon we plan to publish tributes to Clive on the website and eventually a full account of his contribution to wader science and conservation will appear in Wader Study. In the meantime members are asked to send their tributes and remembrances of Clive to chair@waderstudygroup.org for publication on the website.   Featured image: Waders in flight, 2006 Delaware Bay (Simon Gillings).

The department of Coastal Systems (COS) is looking for a highly motivated Postdoc. We offer a postdoctoral position of maximally 3 years on movement and spatial ecology of shorebirds under the supervision of Dr. Allert Bijleveld. This project is part of ongoing research on understanding how individual differences, sociality and the distribution of resources affect movement and spatial distributions of shorebirds in the Dutch Wadden Sea. ‍ LOCATION:            ROYAL NIOZ TEXEL (THE NETHERLANDS) VACANCY ID:         2019 - 78 CLOSING DATE:    December 5, 2019 Apply there: https://www.workingatnioz.com/our-jobs/postdoc-movement-ecology-%E2%80%9Cstudying-the-causes-of-shorebird-movement-and-habitat-selection%E2%80%9D.html   THE DEPARTMENT The Department of COS studies integral coastal ecosystems and their populations of fish, birds and other marine animals in the North and Wadden Seas as well as on a global scale. The department focusses on key physical, chemical and biological processes that determine the productivity and the ecological functioning of coastal areas. The coastal system is studied as a unity by considering the interrelations between the key compartments of the ecosystem (water, sediment, microalgae, macrozoobenthos, parasites, fish and birds). ‍ THE PROJECT The Wadden Sea is a UNESCO world heritage site and important for many migratory shorebirds, such as Red knots that arrive in the Wadden Sea after breeding in the Arctic to moult their feathers and feed on shellfish. To track shorebirds in the Dutch Wadden Sea, we have deployed the novel high-resolution tracking system WATLAS. Since 2017, we have tracked approximately 450 individual Red Knots with a position fix every 1 to 6 seconds for a duration of 2-8 months each year. In the coming years, we additionally aim to track 300 individuals each year. The general aim within this postdoc project is to understand the movement and spatial distribution of shorebirds in their dynamic intertidal habitat. Each summer, with the SIBES project, we additionally sample the distribution of prey in the entire Dutch Wadden Sea. This allows analysing how movement and spatial distributions of Red Knots depend on variation in the distribution of prey. Besides analysing existing data and writing manuscripts, the successful candidate will help keep the WATLAS tracking system operational and do field work. This will include sailing with the RV Navicula to deploy receiver stations on the mudflats of the Wadden Sea, and catching and tagging birds on the uninhabited island Griend. ‍ THE CANDIDATE Applicants must have a PhD degree, or aim to submit their PhD thesis for assessment by spring 2020. A background in animal behaviour and/or ecology, experience with handling large data sets, and the analysis of animal movement data are required. Because the successful candidate will have large amounts of tracking data available, strong statistical, analytical and computational skills are critical. Practical experience with field work is advantageous. The successful candidate is also expected to have good collaborative skills and proven abilities to publish and present at a high international level. Preferably, the candidate starts before spring 2020. Interested applicants should submit a CV, names and contact information for 3 references, and a cover letter by December 5, 2019. The cover letter should include (1) a summary of the applicant’s research and (2) their experience with the analyses of movement and spatial data, and (3) 1-3 research questions and approaches that the applicant would like to pursue with the WATLAS tracking data.   CONDITIONS We offer a postdoctoral position of maximally 3 years, a pension scheme, a yearly 8% vacation allowance, 42 days of holiday leave (for a full-time appointment) 8,3 % year-end bonus and flexible employment conditions. Advanced training opportunities are available. Conditions are based on the Collective Labour Agreement of Research Centers. Cost of relocation and help with housing is provided by Royal NIOZ. Additional information on job details: Dr. A.I. (Allert) Bijleveld, scientist. For additional information on the procedure, please contact Sigrid Moerbeek (senior HR advisor)‍ Please note that by December 10th we aim to invite suitable candidates for an interview on December 16th, 2019       Featured image: Large flock of Sanderlings. Griend, central Dutch Wadden sea. August 2014.

ÉLVONAL Shorebird Science (elvonalshorebirds.com) is happy to announce the III. ÉLVONAL conference during 10–12 January 2020 in Debrecen (Hungary) followed by workshop „Modeling population dynamics: Estimating demographic parameters for wildlife conservation“ in the same venue during 13–19 January 2020 led by Brett Sandercock.   Find more details here: III. ÉLVONAL CONFERENCE – III.ELVONAL conference flyer DEMOGRAPHIC WORKSHOP – Demography Workshop December 2020 details Both events will be full of new and stimulating ideas (not only about shorebirds worldwide) as well as they will provide plentiful opportunities for networking and developing future projects – everything complemented with a friendly atmosphere and traditional Hungarian cultural experiences. We are looking forward to meeting you in Debrecen! Vojtěch Kubelka (on the behalf of organizing teams) [caption id="attachment_13018" align="aligncenter" width="330"] Crispy morning in NP Hortobagy – a field excursion during II. ÉLVONAL conference in January 2019. Photo: Vojtěch Kubelka.[/caption] Featured image: Masked Lapwing (Vanellus miles) during aggressive nest defence above tropical grasslands in Daintree NP, Australia. Photo: Vojtěch Kubelka.  

Times Doors open at 10.00; talks start at 10.30 Lunch 12.00 (Bookable in the centre on the day) AGM at 13.00 Talks resume 13.30 Close at 15.00 There will be a number of speakers talking about a variety of upbeat wader related subjects. Speaker schedule: 10.30 – 11.00 Rick Simpson; Wader Quest – An Inspiration of Waders 11.00 – 11.30 Jess Owen; WWT – Project Godwit 11.30 – 12.00 Ben Potterton; Norfolk based zoologist with a particular interest in plants and birds – Stone Curlew habitat adaption by the Breckland Specialist 13.30 – 14.00 Harry Ewing; PhD student, School of Biological Sciences, University of East Anglia – Saving the UK’s most threatened breeding wader 14.00 – 14.30 Graham Appleton; Wadertales – 60 Years of Wader Ringing on the Wash 14.30 – 15.00 Craig Jones; Wildlife & Conservation Photographer – Norfolk Rhapsody Harry Ewing; PhD student, School of Biological Sciences, University of East Anglia – Saving the UK’s most threatened breeding wader Free entry to Friends of Wader Quest and Sponsor representatives (2 per Sponsor) £5.00 for non-members: redeemable if becoming a Friend or Sponsor on the day. Book for this major event at: Eventbrite / agm@waderquest.net

Save the Date! The 1st East Asian-Australasian Flyway Shorebird Science Meeting to be held at the National Institute of Ecology, Seocheon-gun, Chungcheongnam-do, Republic of Korea, 5-8 May 2020.   The 1st East Asian-Australasian Flyway (EAAF) Shorebird Science Meeting will be held at the National Institute of Ecology, Seocheon-gun, Chungcheongnam-do, Republic of Korea (May 5-8, 2020). This meeting will support international efforts to study, monitor, and conserve migratory shorebirds. Shorebird biologists, wetland ecologists, researchers, practitioners, students, land managers and other professionals working on shorebird conservation from across the EAAF are invited to participate in this meeting, allowing interchange and collaboration among shorebird scientists and conservationists across the flyway. The scientific program will include three days of plenary lectures, symposia sessions, oral and poster presentations, species- or issue-specific workshops and side meetings. The final day will include a bird-watching field trip to the Geum Estuary intertidal area where thousands of migratory shorebirds will be staging. A “call for program content” will be issued in October/November 2019. Submissions will be evaluated by a scientific committee of international shorebird experts, chaired by Prof. Richard Fuller of the University of Queensland, and successful applicants will be contacted in early 2020 for inclusion into the program. Local Organizers include “Jackie” Sung Ryong Kang and “Jay” Junhyup Kim of the National Institute of Ecology, Republic of Korea – a government-affiliated institute under the Ministry of Environment, which provides ecology related services including research, conservation, education, and exhibition (more local organizers and sponsors will be updated). The Organizing committee includes Jackie and Jay, as well as Dr. Rick Lanctot (US Fish and Wildlife Service) and David Li (National Parks Board, Singapore) from the East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership Shorebird Working Group, and Courtney Price from the Arctic Migratory Birds Initiative . Additional information will be posted on a new website soon.   Featured image: Pacific Golden Plover, 5th may 2018, Lady Elliot Island, Queensland, Australia (c) P. Kavanagh on flickr

Shorebirds have been intensively studied in some parts of the world, but much less so in other areas. Take Myanmar, for example: this country in southeast Asia has a continuous coastline of almost 3,000 km. It is a place with abundant intertidal mudflats and mangroves, yet, the importance of this country’s coastal wetlands was not documented until 2014¹. Even after the significance of this coastline was known, few of the intertidal sites or mangroves had any formal protection, in part because the in-depth monitoring needed to describe the site for protection hadn’t yet been done. Now, thanks to work by Zockler and colleagues², published in this issue of Wader Study, we know enough about this incredible place – in particular the Myeik Archipelago in southern Myanmar – to recommend protection. Their surveys found over 35,000 birds representing 32 wader species as well as gulls, terns, egrets and herons. Importantly these species included four globally threatened and eight near-threatened species. These data show that the area qualifies as a Wetland of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention. [caption id="attachment_12900" align="alignnone" width="700"] The landscape of the Myeik Archipelago and one of the boats used for fieldwork. (photo: Christoph Zöckler)[/caption] Why did it take so long for this area to be surveyed? There are numerous reasons, but two practical ones are that the area is remote and there was a lot of area to cover. The region surveyed by Zockler and colleagues covered 620,000 hectares. To give some context, a perfect square-shaped hectare is 100 metres on every side. The grassy area inside a 400-metre running track is typically just over a hectare. Now imagine 620,000 running tracks or an area about the size of the state of Delaware. Now take that area and stretch it out in a narrow 5–10 km band of mangrove and mudflat about 250 km long. It took eight separate surveys, conducted from December 2013 to November 2017, to cover the area and some key areas were surveyed repeatedly. Much of the area is covered with mature mangrove forest and is largely untouched by human interference. It must have been beautiful to see, but some parts of it were difficult to access for study. The intertidal flats consist of deep mud that is impossible to walk on. Local people use wooden sledges to move around, but that was impractical for large scale surveys. Instead, the researchers used small boats, most about 9 meters in length. These boats were sturdy enough to cross larger areas of water, even during rough seas, but still small enough to access shallow areas with shallow water. Four to six shorebird observers worked and slept on these study boats along with a boat operator. In areas too shallow for the 9-meter boats to enter, the researchers used 3-meter fishing boats, hired on site, which carried two observers plus a driver. Beyond the boats, binoculars and spotting scopes were needed to survey and identify the birds to the species level. Digital cameras were also used to capture images that could be magnified to identify species. Finally, modern technology was used to tag bird records with GPS coordinates through a mobile phone application. The researchers recorded more than 35,000 water birds and point out that the Myeik archipelago might support even higher numbers since they were not able to visit all sites suitable for water birds in the survey area. Still, the surveys were enough to show that certain areas of the site are particularly important. For example, Sakhan Thit in the north and Bokpyin in the south alone hosted over 25,000 water birds, including several globally near-threatened species. The Bokpyin area had the highest concentration of globally red-listed species, and all six globally threatened species occurred there – some in significant numbers. For example, up to 60 of the globally endangered Nordmann’s Greenshank Tringa guttifer were counted during the study period. The critically endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea was found at two sites. One Far-Eastern Curlew Numenius madagascariensis was observed among a flock of almost 2,000 Eurasian Curlews in the Bokpyin area – the first record of this species for Myanmar. Finally, a Crab Plover Dromas ardeola was observed among a flock of over 100 Gull-billed Terns north of Bokpyin, only the second record for Myanmar. The Myeik archipelago is clearly important, but it is also under threat. Coastal development is the biggest danger because the archipelago is close to the booming city of Myeik. The southern town of Bokpyin is likely to expand too, threatening intertidal mud and sandflats, as well as the mangroves north and south of town. Hunting is another potential threat. Villagers in the area report that hunters set up their traps whenever there are flocks of about 1000 water birds. What is really needed is formal protection for the region. The authors propose the creation of Ramsar sites within the area and the results of their research justify this designation. According to the Ramsar convention, any wetland which meets at least one of the Criteria for Identifying Wetlands of International Importance can be designated by the appropriate national authority to be added to the Ramsar List³. The surveys show that the Myeik archipelago meets four of the nine Ramsar criteria.

1. The area harbours rare species including six globally threatened and nine near-threatened water birds.
2. The area supports critical life cycle stages of species such as the Lesser Adjutant Stork Leptoptilos javanicus, which nests in all five sections of the surveyed area.
3. The area supports more than 20,000 water birds (numbers from all five survey sections amount to over 35,000 waders, gulls, terns, egrets and herons).
4. Finally, the area supports more than 1% of a global flyway population for several species as outline in Table 4 of the paper.

However, the researchers point out that, though a Ramsar designation would protect the key areas for water birds in the region, it might not cover the adjacent mangroves and other coastal habitats. They therefore recommend the creation of an overarching UNESCO Biosphere Reserve which would encompass the Ramsar sites as core areas. If the researchers are successful in their proposal for conservation of the site, then this research is an example of how impactful shorebird monitoring can be. The site will, of course, need further monitoring. The researchers point out that current funding levels will not allow for annual surveys of the entire area and recommend that key areas be surveyed regularly to provide insights into populations trends and species responses conservation measures and ongoing threats and pressures. Zockler and colleagues aren’t the only authors whose work highlights the importance of surveys and monitoring of shorebirds. Also in this issue of Wader Study, Colwell and colleagues report on monitoring at the local level to confirm the importance of Humboldt Bay, California, as a site of Hemispheric importance under the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network (WHSRN). On a larger scale, Hope and colleagues synthesize data from monitoring at a national level to update information on the population sizes, trends and distributions of 52 shorebird taxa that regularly visit Canada. This type of assessment for conservation prioritization was last done in nearly 20 years ago during the development of the Canadian Shorebird Conservation Plan. Basic ecological monitoring sometimes gets the short shrift in a world obsessed with “new and shiny things”. Studies in this issue of Wader Study remind us that effective conservation can’t happen without knowing what is important, where it lives, what it needs to thrive, and whether or not interventions are working. Good old fashion monitoring gives us this information and remains important for shorebird protection at local, regional and national levels. Add page numbers before publishing. 1. Zöckler, C., T. Zaw Naing, S. Moses, R. Nou Soe & T. Htin Hla. 2014. The importance of the Myanmar Coast for waterbirds. Stilt 66: 37–51. 2. Zöckler, C., S. Moses & Thu Lwin, S. 2019. The importance of the Myeik mangroves and mudflats, Tanintharyi, Myanmar for migratory waders and other waterbirds. Wader Study 126(2): 129-141 3. Ramsar. 2019. Designating Ramsar Sites. Accessed 11 Aug 2019 at: https://www.ramsar.org/sites-countries/designating-ramsar-sites and https://www.ramsar.org/sites/default/files/documents/library/ramsarsites_criteria_eng.pdf 4. Colwell, M.A., E.J. Feucht & C. Polevy. 2019. Winter abundance of shorebirds on Humboldt Bay, California, USA. Wader Study 126(2): 116-124. 5. Hope, D.D, C. Pekarik, M.C. Drever, P.A. Smith, C. Gratto-Trevor, J. Paquet, Y. Aubry, G. Donaldson, C. Friis, K. Gurney, J. Rausch, A.E. McKellar & B. Andres. 2019. Shorebirds of conservation concern in Canada – 2019. Wader Study 126(2): 88-100. PDF is available for download here: https://www.waderstudygroup.org/article/12952/

The IWSG Small Projects Grants aim to support shorebird studies that otherwise will not go ahead. This could be all sorts of projects related to waders (shorebirds): ecological and/or conservation research, pilot studies looking at biological aspects of a single or a few species, or counts of staging birds at unexplored sites. Or something completely different! Application is open for IWSG members who have a project idea that could be undertaken if supported with a small amount of money (currently 1000 Euros per project). In the below link you can find a description of criteria and the application form. The IWSG Executive Committee has appointed an evaluation committee that will judge the applications, and decide which project will be awarded. Application form - IWSG Small Project Grants Call Applications should be submitted by December 1st 2019, and a decision will be made before 1st of May 2020. Details on the previous recipients of the IWSG Small Grants there: https://www.waderstudygroup.org/projects/small-grants/ [caption id="attachment_8912" align="aligncenter" width="330"] ©Darío Podestá. 2016 IWSG Small Project Grant winner, Glenda D. Hevia collecting data from Two-Banded Plover nests during fieldwork at Península Valdés, Patagonia Argentina.[/caption]   Featured image: ©Jannik Hansen

Moreton Bay in Queensland, Australia, is widely recognized as an important site for shorebirds in the East Asian–Australasian Flyway with 23 migrating species regulary occuring on and one of the largest populations of the ‘Critically Endangered’ Far-Eastern Curlew in Australia. The bay also welcome internationally significant numbers of Whimbrel, Bar-tailed Godwit, Lesser Sand-Plover, Curlew sandpiper, Grey-tailed Tattler, Red-Necked Stint and Pacific Golden Plover. This Ramsar site is threatened by a marina plan project which would permanently destroy essential shorebird feeding habitats. Sign the petition relayed by BirdLife International: "International pressure will play a key role in ensuring this precious Ramsar site is protected for migratory shorebirds. Please sign the petition" [caption id="attachment_12840" align="aligncenter" width="330"] Bar-tailed Godwits roosting at Moreton Bay. ©Chris Walker.[/caption] Featured image: Far-Eastern Curlew ©Duade Paton. Link to a short ABC News video about the Queensland Toondah Harbour Development there: https://youtu.be/BxL62EPIgPA

Publication update - 26/08/2019: Referred to it by the LPO, The French Council of State modified the decree allowing hunting of 6000 Curlews in the 2019/20 season, fixing the quota at ZERO to meet France's obligations under Bird Directive and AEWA, with immediate effect. No more curlews to be shot this season!  https://twitter.com/numenini/status/1166281289818939392?s=20 Publication update - 05/08/2019: Considering the France's lack of compiliance with AEWA, the IWSG has submitted a call to UNEP AEWA to undertake an Implementation Review Process: https://twitter.com/WaderStudy/status/1157331246793527298 Original post: A French decree allowing the hunting of 6 000 Eurasian Curlew have been subject to public consultation. The 2019 hunting season will start the first Saturday of August in the Public Maritime Domain and on 15th September in remaining areas. In a letter sent this week to the French ministry, the expert committee on adaptive management, mainly formed by academic researchers, regrets that its concerns and recommendations have been not addressed by the government. The expert committee recommended, in its Opinion to the Minister of the Ecological and Solidary Transition, to not authorize any curlew harvest throughout the national territory, including the Maritime Public Domain, until significant knowledge gaps and related uncertainties linked to available data on the demography of the species, the spatial distribution of populations and hunting practices, have been addressed. The previous hunting bag of Curlew was estimated to be 6 961 individuals in 2013/14 (Aubry et al. 2016). The quotas of 6 000 individuals proposed in the decree were not supported by any adaptive harvest management (AHM) process because the expert committee was not able to evaluate the impact of hunting on the population dynamics and therefore could not decide on any sustainable hunting bag.

The expert committee on adaptive management in its Opinion about Eurasian Curlew AHM: “It is not possible to determine the level of a sustainable harvest without information on overwintering curlews in France, the winter destinations of European breeding populations, and therefore on the different populations subject to hunting in France. Access to harvest data is essential to determine i) their level accurately, ii) the origin of birds hunted by the stable isotope method, and iii) the age of the birds captured (notably on the basis of data that has been collected for more than ten years). The lack of information on these three parameters results in a set of many unverifiable assumptions that made the projections of the sustainable demographic models unsafe. For example, if the hunting bag in France is 9 500 individuals (the upper confidence interval of hunting bag estimates in 2013/2014), and it is made up of 70% of West-European birds and the harvest rate is independent of age, then the European harvest would consists of 6 650 individuals including 5 320 adults. On the other hand, if the harvest is 4 400 individuals with 10% of West-European birds with a hunting rate two times larger on juveniles, then the harvest on European populations would consists of 440 individuals including 265 adults. Between those two possible scenarios, there is a factor of 20 in the estimated harvest levels, a too important gap to build pertinent recommendations.” Complete expert commitee Opinion (in French) at: http://www.oncfs.gouv.fr//IMG/pdf/gestion-adaptative/Avis-CEGA-Courlis-cendre.pdf

As a reminder, according to the International Single Species Action Plan for the Conservation of the Eurasian Curlew (Brown 2015), France has promised to ensure that any harvest of Curlews is sustainable or otherwise to apply a complete moratorium of hunting until the AHM process has been established. France was the last European country to hunt Eurasian Curlew, classified as Vulnerable in both European regional and EU27 assessments of the European Red List of Birds due to the undergoing rapid population declines across the European part of its extremely large global range. [caption id="attachment_12596" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Much has been done, in terms of financial and human investments in Europe, to try to recover, or at least prevent further declines of Curlew breeding populations (7 Life programmes granted by the EU since 2007 according to the Life programme Database of European Commission 2018). To coordinate all these efforts for the recovery of the Eurasian Curlew, the species is part of the recent International 2018-2028 Multi-Species Action Plan for the Conservation of Breeding Waders in Wet Grassland Habitats in Europe (Leyrer et al. 2018). Image: (c) D. Allemand[/caption]   Link to the 30/07/19 adopted decree at: https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000038864820&categorieLien=id Aubry P., Anstett L., Ferrand Y., Reitz F., Klein F., Ruette S., Sarasa M., Arnauduc J.-P. & Migot P. (2016) Enquête nationale sur les tableaux de chasse à tir - Saison 2013-2014. Résultats nationaux. Faune Sauvage, 310 - Supplément 1, I-VIII. Brown D.J. (2015) International Single Species Action Plan for the Conservation of the Eurasian Curlew Numenius arquata arquata, N. a. orientalis and N. a. suschkini. AEWA Technical Series No. 58. Bonn, Germany. Leyrer J., Brown D., Gerritsen G., Hötker H. & Ottva L. (2018) International Multi-species Action Plan for the conservation of breeding waders in wet grassland habitats in Europe (2018-2028). Report of Action A13 under the framework of Project LIFE EuroSAP (LIFE14 PRE/UK/002). NABU, RSPB, VBN & SO. Featured image: ©F. Cahez

On July 5, 2019, the World Heritage Committee decided to inscribe “the Migratory Bird Sanctuaries along the Coast of the Yellow Sea-Bohai Gulf of China (Phase I)” into the World Heritage List, at the 43 session of the World Heritage Convention. The site features intertidal areas of the Yellow Sea/Gulf of Bohai which are of global importance for the gathering of shorebirds species that use the East Asian-Australasian flyway including 17 globally threatened migratory shorebirds species such as the Spoon-billed Sandpiper Calidris pygmaea (Critically Endangered) and Far Eastern Curlew Numenius madagascariensis (Endangered). [caption id="attachment_12575" align="aligncenter" width="626"] The two components of the property are (i) the Jiangsu Dafeng National Nature Reserve, the southern section and Dongsha Experimental Zone of Jiangsu Yancheng National Nature Reserve and the Tiaozini area and (ii) YS-2 the middle section of Jiangsu Yancheng National Nature Reserve. The total area of the two components is 188,643 ha plus a buffer zone of 80,056 ha.  (c)Unesco World Heritage Convention https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1606[/caption]   Read more: East Asian-Australasian Flyway : https://www.eaaflyway.net/coast-of-yellow-sea-bohai-gulf-of-china-phase-i-inscribed-on-the-wh-list/ BirdLife international: http://www.birdlife.org/worldwide/news/yellow-sea-shorebird-habitats-secure-world-heritage-listing?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+BirdLife-news-posts-blogs+(BirdLife+Posts)&utm_term=Feed+Post Unesco World Heritage Convention: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1606/   Featured image: © Yancheng Broadcasting Television