The first head of the team of ornithologists since 1933 was a prominent scientist laureate of the State Prize of the USSR and the Kazakh SSR, Doctor of Biological Sciences I. A. Dolgushin. His name is inextricably linked with the development of ornithology in Kazakhstan in all its aspects from purely scientific to applied. The ornithologists have accumulated a huge material on the ornithofauna of Kazakhstan, which served as a basis for the publication of the five-volume summary “The Birds of Kazakhstan” (1960, 1962, 1970, 1972, 1974), which was awarded the State Prize of the Kazakh SSR in 1978.
The head of the Center was Eduard Ivanovich Gavrilov, Doctor of Biological Sciences, Professor, and later Erokhov Sergey Nikolaevich. At present, the Centre is headed by Andrei E. Gavrilov, Ph.D. in Biology. Staff of Laboratory consists of 6 persons, including 5 researchers, 1 doctor of sciences and 2 candidates of sciences. The laboratory is engaged in studying problems of seasonal migrations of wild mammals and birds.
The laboratory has its origin since 1946, when the laboratory of zoogeography and ecology of birds, reptiles and amphibians was organized in the structure of the Institute of Zoology and later renamed to the laboratory of ornithology. Since 1966 the Head of the Laboratory is E.I. Gavrilov, Doctor of Biology. The Laboratory staff included 22 employees, 10 of them were researchers.
Further development of ornithology in Kazakhstan has undergone small changes, the ornithology laboratory in connection with different scientific directions was divided into two laboratories, and as a result the new laboratory “Bird Ringing Centre” was formed.
The Laboratory “Bird Ringing Center” is the only laboratory in Kazakhstan on the marking of birds. Nowadays the following enthusiastic scientists work at the laboratory: head of the Lab Ph.D. in Biology A.E. Gavrilov, Professor E.I. Gavrilov, Ph.D. in Biology S.L. Sklyarenko, Assistant Professor A.Zh. K. Sarsekova, engineer R. I. Egizbaeva.
In spite of such a small number of employees, the Laboratory continues to be actively engaged in scientific activities. Established in 1966 in the foothills of the Western Tien Shan in the Chokpak pass, the first ornithological station for the study of migratory birds in Asia continues to exist to this day.
The Laboratory “Bird Ringing Centre” carries out complex research on the role of wild birds in the circulation of influenza viruses in the territory of Kazakhstan (together with the Laboratory of General Virology of the Institute of Microbiology and Virology and the Otar Institute), the study of bird migration, which is of great theoretical and practical interest. Bird ringing has been resumed at the colonies of Lake Alakol, where a colony of rare relict gulls was discovered in 1968, and at Lake Sorbulak.
The laboratory is processing data on ring entries, ring returns, ring doubles and ring repeats. The cameral processing was carried out and computer programs were written: sampling spring migration data from the returns file; sampling autumn migration data from the returns file; ringing data by bird species for all ringing years; control of spring migration file coordinates; control of autumn migration file coordinates; conversion of spring migration file coordinates into decimal system; conversion of autumn migration file coordinates into decimal system; conversion of returns file coordinates into decimal system; sampling of returns encountered at the ring site