Curlew species thought to be extinct by conservationists in first for Europe - The slender-billed curlew could be the first known global bird extinction from mainland Europe, north Africa and west Asia.

The slender-billed curlew was a species of wading bird last officially seen three decades ago. Despite the occasional unsubstantiated reports since then, researchers have combed through all the available data and concluded that the bird is now extinct.

The birds are a migratory shorebird that were originally bred in western Siberia and migrated to the Mediterranean in winter.

The slender-billed curlew, a once-elusive waterbird, has been declared officially extinct, researchers from the British Bird Conservation Society and the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden announced in a scientific article.

A bird species found in mainland Europe and the Mediterranean is thought to be extinct globally by a coalition of conservation groups.The slender-billed curlew – a migratory shorebird that bred in western Siberia and migrated to the Mediterranean in winter – could be the first known global bird extinction from mainland Europe,