Animal Demography Unit - Coordinated Waterbird Counts (CWAC)

The Coordinated Waterbird Counts (CWAC) project was launched in 1992. The objective of CWAC is to monitor South Africa's waterbird populations and the conditions of the wetlands which are important for waterbirds. This is being done by means of a programme of regular mid-summer and mid-winter censuses at a large number of South African wetlands. Regular six-monthly counts are conducted; however, we do encourage counters to survey their wetlands on a more regular basis as this provides better data. CWAC currently monitors over 400 wetlands around the country on a regular basis, and furthermore curates waterbird data for close to 600 wetlands.