[Objectives] Poyang Lake is an extremely important wintering ground for waterbirds along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway. With the degradation of the Poyang Lake wetland ecosystem, an increasing number of waterbirds have shifted their foraging habitats from natural wetlands to agricultural fields, leading to an intensified human-bird conflict. To assess the current situation of human-bird conflicts around Poyang Lake, we conducted questionnaire surveys at villages around Poyang Lake. [Methods] Questionnaire surveys were conducted in October 2023 and December 2024 in Nanchang City, Jiujiang City, and Shangrao City around Poyang Lake, focusing on farmers’ crop damage situations, preventive measures, and their attitudes toward bird conservation and ecological compensation during the autumn and winter of 2022 and 2024. A total of 219 valid questionnaires were collected, including 128 from 2023 and 91 from 2024. [Results] The survey results indicated that geese (90.30%), ducks (86.78%), and cranes (70.69%) were the main waterbirds causing crop damage. Rice (91.93%) was the most damaged crop, followed by rapeseed (45.11%). There were significant interannual variations in crop damage. There were more waterbirds in unharvested agricultural fields (Fig. 1), larger area of crop damaged (Fig. 2), greater financial losses (Fig. 2), and higher frequency of driving away waterbirds (Fig. 3) in 2022 than in 2024. Regarding farmers’ attitudes toward ecological compensation and bird conservation, 77.78% of farmers reported that the ecological compensation amount accounted for less than 10% of their actual losses, and 82.03% were dissatisfied with the compensation amount. Although 80.66% of farmers perceived that waterbirds were not beneficial to agricultural production, 60.95% of farmers were still willing to protect birds. [Conclusion] The extreme severe drought in Poyang Lake in 2022 may intensify waterbird use of agricultural fields, thereby increasing the risk of human-bird conflicts. To alleviate the human-bird conflicts around Poyang Lake, we recommend enhancing the restoration of natural wetlands around Poyang Lake, rationally managing the scale of artificial food provision, increasing ecological compensation standards, optimizing compensation distribution methods, and promoting commercial insurance for wildlife accidents. With the increasing frequency of extreme weather events in the future, it is expected that the risk of human-bird conflicts around Poyang Lake would increase, making the effective mitigation strategies a critical contemporary challenge.