Siberian Crane Mystery Ruffles Some Feathers : Ecology: An intriguing theory suggests that the birds are being shot down over Afghanistan.

Fewer Siberian cranes are migrating to their favorite wintering ground in the marshes of western India, and some bird watchers fear that they are being shot down over Afghanistan.

Only 17 cranes arrived this winter in the Keoladeo National Park at Bharatpur, once a duck-shooting preserve of maharajahs and now a sanctuary for more than 400 bird species.

The small number cannot be “taken lightly” because 24 cranes came in the winter of 1988-89 and 31 the winter before that, said V.S. Vijayan, a scientist with the Bombay Natural History Society who has been working at Bharatpur.

Indian wildlife officials and environmentalists agree with Jim Harris, an ornithologist with the International Crane Foundation based in Baraboo, Wis., that the birds may be falling victim to gunners in Afghanistan’s war.

A Soviet scientist rejected that theory, and other Indian officials said recurring drought in Bharatpur may be contributing to the declining number of arrivals at the sanctuary.

The group gathered recently to discuss the cranes at the Bombay Natural History Society office in Bharatpur.

Ornithologists know little about the red-beaked white birds that fly more than 3,100 miles in about one month from their breeding ground in the tundras of western Siberia to Bharatpur in Rajasthan state in western India.

A smaller flock migrates to Iran. The two flocks, perhaps totaling fewer than 50 birds, leave the Ob River valley in Soviet Siberia in September or October, just as it is starts snowing. They return in late February or early March.

The India-bound flock probably makes only two stopovers--in Soviet Kazakhstan and in Afghanistan, according to Vladimir Flint, head of the Soviet Union’s Animal Protection Department at the All-Union Research Institute of Nature Conservation and Reserves in Moscow.

No precise estimates are available of the number of western Siberian cranes. Harris put the figure at fewer than 50, but other estimates place it as high as 200.

“There is very little data about the birds,” Flint said during the session. “We hardly know anything about them except that they fly over Iran and Afghanistan to the marshes here.”

Said Harris: “And there are a lot of people with guns in Afghanistan who are waiting to pull the trigger.”

Since the birds are safe from humans in the inaccessible Siberian tundras and in the sanctuary at Bharatpur, Harris added, it is likely that they are being killed during migration.

“I do not agree that the birds are being killed over Afghanistan,” said Flint. “Our next goal is to know the whole migration route and the dangers they face.”

Prakash Gole, head of the Ecological Society based in Poona, India, agreed with Harris that Siberian cranes may have been killed in Afghanistan. He said other kinds of cranes were shot and sold for meat in Afghanistan even before the war between the Soviet-backed government and U.S.-supported Muslim guerrillas started in 1978.

Harris also said a dead Siberian crane turned up last year at a local meat market in Pakistan.

The freshwater wasteland at Bharatpur, about 30 miles west of the Taj Mahal in Agra, was declared a shooting preserve for local maharajahs and British colonial rulers in 1902.

Bird shooting was outlawed here in 1972, and the marsh was declared a national park in 1981.

The park’s director, K.L. Saini, said in an interview later that the Afghanistan theory is “an interesting one.”

“But it is highly likely that the frequent droughts in the area may be the main reason for their decreasing number,” he added. “Until about eight years ago, we used to have regular floods which kept the marsh alive and produced enough food for the birds.”

Another group of cranes, apparently no different from the western Siberian crane, breeds in eastern Siberia and migrates to China in winter. The eastern Siberian cranes are believed to number at least 1,400. Like the western cranes, they are considered endangered species.

Flint said the Soviets have initiated studies to genetically compare the two species, “but my guess is there will be no difference.”

The declining crane migration is also worrying naturalists who earn their living by conducting tours of the sanctuary.

“Everyone comes to Bharatpur to see the Siberian cranes,” said Udai Singh, who conducts tours. “And when they stop coming here, even the tourists will stop, and I guess we will have to close shop.”

Singh’s one-day tours cost $100 for a Western tour group and $7.35 each for Indian groups.