The Hoopoe Summit: Day 2

We are in high spirits as we continue our mission to develop the Hoopoe Declaration and learn about the local ecosystem.

On the second day of the summit we split into for groups and teamed up with national park rangers who are going to educate us about their workplace for the week ahead. By bike, we were exploring the protected landscape which is characterized by vast grasslands, salt marshes and saline lakes famous for the number of (rare) bird species stopping there.

The area is very special for Austria as it is strongly influenced by the Pannonian climate while most of the country is predominantly impacted by alpine or western European climate types.

Common bird species in the area that we identified include the White Stork, the Lapwing, the Skylark and the Western Marsh Harrier. The national park is located on a popular migratory path for birds as well as an important breeding space. Each group started a bird race with their ranger keeping track of all the species they identify.

In the evening there was the second discussion on the Hoopoe Declaration which was presented by the Spanish Group. They identified political, socio-economical and sociological problems for climate change apathy which was the topic of the session.

Later in the discussions we came up with possible solutions and divided them into collective solutions like education or more positive news about successful climate action and individual ones like creating awareness or calculating your own ecological footprint.