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An endangered bird famous for its elaborate leaping courtship displays is being reared in a special facility where the animals are able to develop their wild instincts.
With less than 600 individuals left in the wilds of Cambodia, conservationists have shown that the Bengal florican can successfully grow up in semi-captivity, raising hope that a safe and stable population can be reintroduced to prevent further declines.
A large facility inside the 144 square miles of forest comprising Phnom Kulen National Park is the world’s first assurance colony of this florican’s Indo-Chinese subspecies. As the name implies, it’s native to Bangladesh and India, where it is also endangered.
Amid waist-high grass, soft mesh netting divides areas for these members of the bustard family to grow up in seclusion. Minimal visual contact with their keepers ensures that these birds have room to practice all the important skills they’ll need for wild living—like foraging, keeping a lookout for predators, but most importantly for a florican, how to find a mate.
All species of floricans look to dazzle prospective mates with a remarkable courtship display. Standing in high grass, they will leap between 6 and 9 feet off the ground whilst striking a heroic pose that involves tucking their legs up and leaning back.
Hardly flightless, their goal isn’t to take to the wing, but to stay airborne enough to attract the attention of a female, before falling back to the ground and disappearing among the grasses.
Unfortunately, these birds need grasslands to live in, but grasslands in their native range are rapidly being turned into agricultural land by a developing South Asian population.
Leaping into action
The Angkor Centre for Conservation of Biodiversity (ACCB) established the captive colony in 2019. Cambodia has a high degree of threatened biodiversity, with over 400 species listed as Endangered or Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, and 56 considered Critically Endangered.
The Bengal florican is just one of 30 such species held at the ACCB for future protection. The florican has just one remaining wild population of fewer than 600 individuals among the Tonle Sap Floodplains.
Conservationists from the ACCB work mainly to educate community members, especially Buddhist communities and students, about the plight of these ground-nesting birds.
“By engaging with diverse groups, we hope to bridge the conservation gap across generations,” Christel Griffioen, ACCB’s Country Director, told the IUCN.
These connections with the community have proved vital to the ACCB’s work. During the florican breeding season, the ACCB is notified where and when a wild florican nest is located. Depending on the timing in the season and the placement of the nest, ACCB biologists may choose to leave the eggs alone, but if the conditions aren’t optimal for chick mortality, they will safeguard the eggs, hatch them in their facility, and rear the birds in captivity for eventual reintroduction into the wild.
So far, the 11 surviving birds hatched at ACCB from eggs laid in the wild, along with four wild-hatched birds that have been taken in for one reason or another, are living and developing well.
“A full-time team at ACCB is dedicated to hand-rearing newly hatched chicks until they’re old enough to feed alone. They’re then moved into a facility that mimics their habitat where they remain, with limited to no human contact, safely cocooned in taller grass and soft ceilings that allow the males to practice their mating display,” writes the IUCN, noting that Christel and her team are always trying to transfer what they know about these birds in the wild to their conditions at the facility.
The conservationists hope to form a captive breeding program to further stabilize the animal’s numbers. WaL
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PICTURED ABOVE: Two Bengal Floricans chicks being hand-reared at ACCB. PC: ACCB Maria Blümm Rexach, released via IUCN.
