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White Stork

Birds

The white stork is a large, long-legged wading bird that breeds across much of Europe, parts of North Africa and western Asia, migrating to sub-Saharan Africa or the Indian subcontinent for the winter. It is mostly white with black flight feathers, a long red bill and red legs, and it is famous in European folklore for its supposed role in delivering newborn babies, a legend tied to its habit of nesting on rooftops and chimneys close to human settlements. White storks feed on a varied diet of insects, frogs, small mammals and fish, foraging in meadows, farmland and wetlands, and they build enormous stick nests that are reused and enlarged over many years, sometimes by successive generations of the same pair. Once in decline across parts of western Europe due to wetland drainage and changing farming practices, the species has recovered strongly in many countries thanks to conservation efforts and reintroduction programs.

Facts

Classification

Diet

Carnivore 2

System (Realm)

Terrestrial 3

System (Realm)

Freshwater 3

Relationship to People

Agricultural or Structural Pest 4

Living or Extinct

Yes 1

Derived from this species' own Conservation Status: this atlas's IUCN category list has no Extinct value, so a set conservation-status is itself evidence of living status.

Identification

Distinguishing Appearance

Its plumage is mainly white, with black on the bird's wings. Adults have long red legs and long pointed red beaks, and measure on average 100 to 115 centimetres from beak tip to end of tail, with a 155 to 215 centimetre wingspan. 1

Comparison

CITES Appendix

Not Listed 4

Scientific Name

Ciconia ciconia 1

Conservation Status

Least Concern 1

Connections

Child Taxon Of

Source Catalogue of Life

In Biome

Source White Stork (Wikipedia)

Source White Stork (Wikipedia)

Open Questions

What is the white stork's current global population, as a number?

Source White Stork (Wikipedia)

In the Other Atlases

Found In

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Bosnia and Herzegovina

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North Macedonia

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Sources

1. White Stork (Wikipedia)

Wikimedia Foundation

Lead sentence
The white stork (Ciconia ciconia) is a large bird in the stork family, Ciconiidae.
Introduction
Its plumage is mainly white, with black on the bird's wings. Adults have long red legs and long pointed red beaks, and measure on average 100-115 cm (39-45 in) from beak tip to end of tail, with a 155-215 cm (61-85 in) wingspan.
Infobox: status
LC
In Biome: Wetlands, Distribution and habitat
The white stork's preferred feeding grounds are grassy meadows, farmland and shallow wetlands.
In Biome: Grassland, Distribution and habitat
The white stork breeds in greater numbers in areas with open grasslands, particularly grassy areas which are wet or periodically flooded, and less in areas with taller vegetation cover such as forest and shrubland.

View the Source

2. EltonTraits 1.0 (Wilman et al. 2014)

3. GBIF Species API

GBIF Species APIView the Source

4. Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan Museum of Zoology: Ciconia ciconia (Animal Diversity Web)

Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan Museum of Zoology

Economic Importance for Humans: Negative Impacts
Negative Impacts household pest
Conservation Status: CITES
CITES No special status

View the Source

Wikidata: White Stork

Wikidata Q25352, class allow-list match (w-wdresolver-0926)View the Source

White Stork (Wikidata)

Wikidata

Wikidata Q25352 (P1034 main food source): insect
Main food source (Wikidata property P1034): insect.
Wikidata Q25352 (P1034 main food source): earthworm
Main food source (Wikidata property P1034): earthworm.

View the Source

Catalogue of Life

Species 2000 & ITIS Catalogue of LifeChild Taxon Of: AvesView the Source

Open Questions (1 open question)

What is the white stork's current global population, as a number?

The Wikipedia article consulted gives only scattered national and regional breeding-pair counts (for example Poland, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria); a secondary web search found a BirdLife-attributed figure of roughly 700,000 individuals worldwide, but the BirdLife DataZone factsheet page itself is JavaScript-rendered and no raw verbatim figure could be fetched from it this pass.

What would resolve this A verbatim global population figure fetched directly from the BirdLife DataZone factsheet, the European Red List of Birds PDF, or an equivalent named source this atlas can cite with a real locator and quote.

OrnithologyWhite Stork (Wikipedia)

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