On the territory of the contemporary Volgograd region, bird studies began in the second half of the 18th century. First ones were conducted by the heads of large academic expeditions, namely: S. G. Gmelin (1771, 1777), I. I. Lepekhin (1771, 1795), and P. S. Pallas (1788). Therefore, this period of ornithological research can be called the “academic period”.