BEIJING, Feb. 14 (Xinhuanet) -- Scientists found 84 spoon-billed sandpipers in a coastal stretch of Myanmar while Russia reported the numbers of the tiny birds had dropped by 70 percent in the past years in their breeding sites in Siberia, media reported Thursday.

"This is an important piece of the jigsaw," said Simba Chan, senior conservation manager at Britain-based conservation group BirdLife International's Asia Division. "If present trends continue, the spoon-billed sandpiper faces extinction in the next few years. If we are to save the species, we need to identify and conserve not only its breeding sites, but its migration stopover sites and wintering grounds too."

"It was a big relief that we finally have come close to solving the mystery of the wintering sandpipers," said Christopher Zockler, part of the international survey team that also included Thai, Japanese and Russian bird experts.

Spoon-billed sandpipers face a myriad of threats because of their complicated migration routes, expanding shrimp farms and salt pans in Bangladesh, and coastal development in China and South Korea. Their eggs are often eaten by foraging dogs and foxes in Russia.

The World Conservation Union lists the bird as endangered with only 200 to 300 pairs left in the wild.

The discovery of 84 birds wintering in Myanmar -- only one of which appears to have come from Siberia -- raises the prospect of breeding grounds elsewhere, BirdLife said.