Lots of people gathered at the Wular Lake for the 2025 Asian Water Bird Census. Wular Lake is one of the largest fresh water lakes in South Asia. It is located near Bandipora town in the Bandipora district of Jammu & Kashmir. The event was organised by the Department of Wildlife Protection J&K, Wetlands Division and Wular Conservation and Management Authority. In Kashmir, the water fowl census begins in late February. By that time, the water birds begin to collect here. These water birds arrive from Asia, Russia, Arctic Circle, etc. Wular Lake is an important place for these ducks. Some of the ducks arrive in September-October and they use this lake as a staging ground. They stay here and feed themseves after the journey of crossing the Himalayas. Then after increasing their weight, they fly down further south. Several winter birds remain here for the entire winter season in ideal habitat conditions. There is a restored area in Lake Wular where a lot of species of water birds around 20-22 of them are there which require water to breed, move around, etc. Today we will count the numbers of species, and the number of members in each species for 2025 Water Bird Census. This will help us in the future too when we make a census of these water birds and can compare data whether the number of water birds are increasing or decreasing. The water birds are indicators of wetland health, if there are more water birds present then the wetland is considered healthy, said a person involved in water bird census.