A female great hornbill with its chick at the State Horticulture Farm at Kallar in Coimbatore district. , photo credit: file photo
In a tragic turn of events, a great hornbill chick being raised by the mother bird was found dead in the nest after dying of stress following an unsuccessful rescue attempt by local people and forest department staff. Kallar near here on Saturday.
Sources aware of the matter said that the carcass of the chicken was in a state of decomposition. Forest staff checking the hornbill’s cavity nest in a tall tree at the State Horticulture Farm at Kallar near Mettupalayam found no movement of the chick and the mother bird.
The chick, which was expected to spread its wings in a few days, was pecking at the food. However, the movement stopped following which the staff inspected the nest on Saturday.
The death of the chick is suspected to be the effect of heavy rains lashing the Kallar area in the Nilgiri foothills over the past few days, a senior forest department official said. The department suspects that rain water stagnated in the cavity, which led to his death. The post-mortem of the girl’s body was done on Saturday evening.
Its stomach was full of ficus fruits, the official said, indicating that the chick had not been starved.
The mother bird started feeding the chicks alone After the death of its pair on 28 April. On the morning of April 28, the male bird was found in distress at Thuri Palam, about two km from the nest, reportedly after being cornered by macaques near a ficus tree.
The male hornbill was initially rescued by the local people before being handed over to the Forest Department. Videos of the rescue by locals show the hornbill, which is very sensitive to human presence, screaming in distress. Its beak and feet were tied. Though the bird was released in the evening of the same day after examination and treatment by the Government Veterinarian, it died.
“Due to lapse in rescue, two hornbills have lost their lives. If the male was alive, the chick would have twice as much feed and could fledge earlier. The department should sensitize its own staff and local people in hornbill habitat areas on how to handle them in case of rescue, thereby causing minimum stress,” said a conservationist who is working closely with the department. Is.