Abstract: Wuhan Tianhe International Airport is one of the largest airports in Central China in terms of shipping business. The surrounding environment of the airport has been significantly improved in recent years, and there is an urgent need to conduct bird diversity survey and bird strike risk assessment to provide a scientific basis for bird strike prevention. From April 2021 to March 2022, birds in six habitats within 8 km of the airfield area and clearance area were surveyed using the sample line method. A total of 18386 birds of 128 species in 44 families and 17 orders were recorded. The bird strike risk assessment was conducted. The results showed that 24 species were identified at extremely high-risk bird-strike level, 13 species at high-risk bird-strike level, 26 species at medium-risk bird-strike level, 65 species at low-risk bird-strike level, and 68.42% of the extremely high-risk bird species were waterbird. Temporally, the values of the Shannon diversity index, Pielou evenness index and Simpson dominance index were spring > summer > winter > autumn. Spatially, the highest diversity index was found in the wetland-woodland habitat (H=3.37), the lowest in the residential-woodland habitat (H=2.40), and the other four habitat types in the order of wetland (H=3.00) > residential-wetland (H=2.97)>woodland (H=2.81) > airport lawn (H=2.76). Redundancy analysis showed that the contribution and explanation of wetland area to the distribution of birds in the clearance area were 43.4% and 68.6%, respectively. Therefore, Wuhan Tianhe International Airport needs to strengthen wetland management in the clearance area, develop prevention and control strategies for waterfowl, and establish an early warning system for migratory birds in order to further improve the effectiveness of its works in preventing bird strike.

Key words: bird strike, bird diversity, wetland-dominated clearance area, risk assessment, redundancy analysis