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NATURE
By Bhagwandas

With a captivity breeding programme now launched, the bustards just might have a chance of reducing their mortality rate and increasing their number

Breeding the bustard

[[image]]
A houbara bustard fitted with a transmitter.

A natives of Kyzylkum region of Central Asia, the houbara bustard is a rare and highly endangered migratory bird. They start arriving in the arid regions of Pakistan in September and after spending winter in the desert areas, start their return journey in March. 

Because of a myth that the meat of houbara has aphrodisiac qualities, the bird is high in demand and sought after extensively both by hunters from the Gulf and local trappers and poachers. Keeping in view the threats it faces from these human predators — in addition to the natural predators like the fox, wild cats, monitor lizards, birds of prey, etc. — the government has imposed a ban on its hunting and trapping. However, a few special hunting permits are issued to the hunters from the Gulf region.
While the trappers just get between Rs2,000 and Rs3,000 a bird, it fetches around 2,000 to 3,000 dirhams depending on the quality and the age of the bird, when it reaches the Arabian Emirates markets in the Gulf. It changes many hands; the trappers sell it to the traders, who bring the birds to Karachi or to the coastal areas of Sindh and Balochistan.

Earlier, the Karachi airport was a favourite route of the smugglers where the customs staff was either not trained to recognize these rare birds or were willing to accommodate the smugglers who usually declared these birds to be domesticated pets such as chickens, pigeons, etc. But after nature conservation organizations started to highlight the issue and the wildlife department officials increased vigilance, the instances of smuggling from the airport declined. The smugglers now usually send their illegal consignments through boats. A large number of houbaras are kept in small boxes during transportation, and often don't survive long journeys.

Besides their original habitat in the central Asian region, the houbara bustards breed only in the Nag Valley, in Kharan District of Central Balochistan. The Nag Valley had a resident population of houbaras that not only lives there permanently but also reproduces. Almost the entire resident population of houbara faced extinction in the mid '80s when scientists from the Gulf states came and started purchasing the eggs at Rs1,000 and chicks at Rs2,000 a piece.

Those scientists wanted to start a breeding project in their country. The poor natives of the Nag Valley — who otherwise subsisted on livestock and rain-fed agriculture — started earning good money for the eggs and chicks. After a few years the scientists stopped coming, but the natives, thinking that they would return, continued to collect the eggs and chicks from the wilderness for many years, eventually wiping out the entire resident population of houbara from the valley.

The Houbara Foundation, working for the conservation of this rare bird, has set up a Houbara Bustard Research, Rehabilitation and Captive Breeding Centre in the Nag Valley, to reintroduce this bird. The provincial and central governments have agreed to hand over to the foundation the houbaras that were confiscated from the smugglers.

Once at the centre, the birds are thoroughly examined and vaccinated before being released to the wilderness. The vaccination is done to prevent any disease that they might have contracted in captivity, from spreading further.

Brigadier Mukhtar of the foundation said that captive breeding was a long-term programme and it may be years before some success can be achieved. The foundation recently released 42 houbaras among which 10 — six females and four males — were harnessed with transmitters for study of their migration patterns and routes.

Two of these houbaras were eaten by foxes, while the remaining eight are living in the wild. The birds are traced with the help of the antenna; one of the transmitters of a fox-eaten houbara was traced from the house of a shepherd who had found it in the wild.

Haroon Rasheed (doing his PhD in houbara breeding) and Mohammad Sajid Nadeem (doing his PhD in houbara ecology) said study results have so far revealed that the houbaras are polygamous birds. The houbaras are very shy and don't breed in captivity. To restart a houbara population in the Nag Valley, many plants likely by the bird have been planted to supplement the food supply of the bird.

The results from the tracking of transmitter-fitted houbaras have so far established that these birds have become a part of the resident population and have not migrated to Central Asia. However, after the transmitter batteries expire it cannot be stated with conviction whether they will join the migratory population in September and move to the wintering habitats in Punjab and Sindh and then return with them to Central Asia or not.∎

The Review, DAWN, August 31  —  September 6, 2000           15