On a routine bird-watching recce in the Athirapilly-Vazhachal forests last Saturday, environmentalist Martin Gopurathinkal came across scores of Malabar Pied Hornbills, a near-threatened species as per the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.
“Several of them were sitting on a tall tree at some distance between Thumburmuzhi and Athirapilly and it felt nice to see a lot of them together,” says Mr. Gopurathinkal, an avid bird-watcher. The breeding season of these birds is coming on. The Malabar Pied Hornbill is a monogamous bird and the flock must have been there either in pairs or to form them, he says. They nest in hollows of tall trees.
The Athirapilly forest is home to the Great Indian Hornbill, the Common Grey Hornbill, and the Malabar Grey Hornbill besides the Malabar Pied Hornbill.
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“The Malabar Pied Hornbill is endemic to low elevation riparian forests. In the early 2000s, we noticed a decline in their nesting and embarked on a mission to monitor and conserve hornbills. That we are able to sight them during the nesting and fruiting season now indicates a growth in their population. There were reports of their sighting from the Palakkad gap too, which has a similar ecosystem,” says K.H. Amitha Bachan, an academic and founder member of the Western Ghats Hornbill Foundation.