Endangered bird champions sought
There are just 1,000 Bengal floricans left in the wild
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Thursday, 16, Aug 2007 08:09
Some of the world's most endangered birds could be afforded greater protection under a new initiative being launched today.
The initiative, Preventing Extinctions: Saving the World's Critically Endangered Birds, is seeking organisations and individuals who are willing to champion a bird and to contribute funds to its care.
Ian Barber, the RSPB's South Asia officer, said the initiative, launched at the Birdfair at Rutland Water, could be some birds' "last hope".
One of the 189 critically endangered birds being targeted by the scheme is the Bengal florican, the rarest of the world's 27 bustards.
There are just 1,000 of the birds – which resemble small ostriches – left in Cambodia, India and Nepal and conservationists believe that without action they could be extinct within five years.
In the floodplain of Tonle Sap Lake, the largest freshwater lake in south-east Asia, numbers have fallen by about 3,000 in ten years.
"The Bengal florican is now hanging on in only three countries and is under huge pressure in all three," said Mr Barber.
"It is only eight years since the bird's rediscovery in Cambodia and already it is facing oblivion. Even in protected sites in Nepal, land is being taken for agriculture leaving no room for the bird."
Money raised from the new initiative will improve the Cambodian population by helping to fund a government-backed scheme.
Government official Seng Kim Hout said: "On revisiting many of our survey sites, we found the landscape unrecognisable from previous years, squeezing the floricans into a shrinking landscape in which they cannot survive.
"I even once saw a male florican displaying on a dam wall because all the grassland had been converted to irrigated rice."
Martin Davies, the RSPB' s Birdfair co-organiser, commented: "It is still possible to save the florican and all of the other critically endangered birds. What we need is more of the right initiatives in the right places.
"We are not talking about ridiculous amounts of money to make this happen and coming to support and enjoy the Birdfair this weekend is the most straightforward thing anyone can do to help."