Watch the hidden 'nest cam' footage of rare hornbill chicks hatching at Chester Zoo

19th February

By Matt Warner

HIDDEN cameras at Chester Zoo have captured remarkable footage showing the hatching of two rare hornbill chicks.

The rhinoceros hornbill chicks, which are both female, arrived to parents Manu and Liv after an incubation period of around 40 days and are the first to hatch at the zoo for more than 13 years. Chester is the only zoo in the UK to ever successfully breed the species.

The rarely seen film is at the heart of a new series of Channel 4’s The Secret Life of the Zoo.

Conservation experts say the arrival of chicks is made even more special given the remarkable survival story of their parents who were rescued from a fire at the zoo in Dec 2018. The pair was safely led away from the fire by dedicated members of the zoo’s bird team and, within hours, they had been re-homed in another area of the 128 acre site.

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Rare fairy tern gets 20% population boost with birth of seven chicks

Danielle Clent 11:11, Feb 13 2020

The birth of seven new fairy terns has boosted the population of one of New Zealand's rarest birds.

The birds, also called the tara-iti, have "teetered" on the brink of extinction since 1970, the Department of Conservation said.

There are fewer than 40 adult fairy terns and they continue to be critically endangered despite intensive management.

However, the latest breeding season has boosted the population by about 20 per cent.

"Seven chicks is a great season – last year (2018-2019 season) we only had two chicks fledge, so this is a big improvement," biodiversity ranger Ayla Wiles said.

Continued and watch video

California condor chick numbers on rise thanks to innovative procedure

Los Angeles Zoo has come up with a unique way of expanding the population of the rare California condor.

Staff have been working on saving the condor for 30 years, and have now mastered how to fertilise its eggs.

The scavenging birds became so rare in the wild that the last 27 of the species were captured in 1987 and brought into captivity to try and save them from extinction.

The condors, which have a wingspan of up to 9 feet (274 cm), were reintroduced into the wild in the early 1990s but still the numbers didn't grow at an exponential rate.

This is because the condor in the wild only gives birth to one fertile egg a year and that offspring is looked after by two parents.

This year, the zoo has incubated 6 eggs and placed them with three sets of condor parents with great success.

The California condor's numbers in the wild dwindled after human settlement in California, because of poaching, lead poisoning from shot animals they feed on and egg collectors at the beginning of the 20th century. The species is the only surviving bird in the Gymnogyps genus and can live up to 40 years old.

With egg collecting a thing of the past and new laws brought in banning lead in hunter ammunition, the species now has a chance to survive in the wild.

There are now around 500 California condors left in the world.

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Penguins and their chicks' responses to local fish numbers informs marine conservation

MAY 21, 2019

by British Ecological Society

How adult penguins fish and the body condition of their chicks are directly linked to local fish abundance, and could potentially inform fishery management, a new study has found.

The researchers studied an endangered African penguin colony during a rare three-year closure of commercial fisheries around Robben Island, South Africa, and their findings are published today in the Journal of Applied Ecology.

Fishing is often considered to be one of the biggest drivers of biodiversity loss in the ocean. It is so widespread that we lack an understanding of the 'natural' relationships between marine predators and their prey, and thus the extent to which predators are disrupted by competition from fisheries.

This is a critical knowledge gap since many marine predators such as penguins are considered indicator species: a species whose success indicates the condition of their habitat.

Dr. Kate Campbell, who led the research at the University of Cape Town as part of her Ph.D. project, said: "Understanding how African penguins forage to feed their chicks in their variable marine environment can help us identify conservation measures for these endangered populations."

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2,000 baby flamingos rescued after being abandoned in South African drought

The birds are being hand-reared by volunteers as months of dry weather threatens breeding ground

Guardian staff and agencies

Thu 7 Feb 2019 02.49 GMTLast modified on Thu 7 Feb 2019 10.27 GMT

Under warming red light at a rescue centre in Cape Town baby flamingos are fed, weighed and cared for. The chicks are among 2,000 that were rescued after they were abandoned by their parents as dam waters dried up in South Africa.

A special airlift for thousands of baby flamingos is under way in South Africaas drought has put their breeding ground in peril, with a reservoir that hosts one of southern Africa’s largest flamingo populations drying up.

Nicky Stander, rehabilitation manager at the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds in Cape Town (SANCCOB), said her team swung into action when news of the abandoned birds broke last month.

 “We rehabilitate, that’s our business, and with the aim of releasing back into the wild. We have very large facilities here that were built last year. And we thought we were the best people to contribute to this project,” said Stander.

“As time goes on and they grow, we are going have to adapt the way that we house them and make sure that they have long running space so they can exercise their legs.”

South Africa has faced an extended period of severe drought, with the government announcing “day zero” – a moment when dam levels would be so low that they would turn off the taps in Cape Town and send people to communal water collection points.

This apocalyptic notion prompted water stockpiling and panic, but also led to a dramatic reduction in per capita water usage and day zero was eventually averted. But the impacts of the drought are still being felt.

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Borders Chilean flamingo chicks a first for Scotland

KIRSTY SMYTH

Published: 18:57 Saturday 15 September 2018

The owners of a rare bird centre in the Borders have become the first people in Scotland to hand-rear flamingos. Mark Haillay and Owen Joiner of new Oxton visitor attraction, Bird Gardens Scotland, took delivery of nine flamingo eggs last month. Mark Haillay feeds a flamingling at Bird Gardens Scotland in Oxton. Laid by the established Chilean flamingo flock at Chester Zoo, the eggs, which take 30 days to develop, were incubated there before being carefully transported to Oxton to hatch. The two-week-old flaminglings are now being hand-reared by Owen and Mark in the centre’s baby barn. “It’s a special moment when you first hear a flamingo egg grunt, and you know that within 48 hours there will be a chick asleep, resting after its epic journey from inside the egg out into the world,” Mark said. “It’s incredibly exciting to think that these little balls of grey fluff will grow to be majestic flamingos.”

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Heritability explains fast-learning chicks

Date:  August 30, 2018

Source:  Linköping University

Summary:

Both genetic and environmental factors explain cognitive traits, shows a new study carried out on red junglefowl. Researchers at Linköping University in Sweden have shown that the ability of fowl to cope with difficult learning tasks is heritable, while their optimism can be explained by environmental factors.

What determines how rapidly you learn? Or whether you are an optimist or pessimist? The mental processes that determine how an animal (or a human) learns, reasons and processes information are known by the general term cognition. How large is the heritable part, in other words what is explained by genes, and how much is explained by the environment? Research into the differences in cognitive ability of animals has mainly been comparative and has focused on differences between species. Less research has been on understanding variation that exists between individuals within a species.

"The question is growing in biology of why individuals within a species differ in such important traits as cognition. We therefore decided to estimate how much of the variation in cognition we see, that is heritable," says Hanne Løvlie, associate professor in the Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology at Linköping University, and principal investigator for the study.

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Four curlew chicks fledge in Antrim Hills

17 July, 2018 12:59

FOUR curlew chicks have successfully fledged in Co Antrim.

The chicks hatched at Greenmount Hill Farm in Glenwherry on June 4 and fledged last week, the RSPB announced today.

The conservation charity said it is the first time its advisor Neal Warnock has reported a pair of curlews fledging four young. 

Chicks first fledged on the farm last year for the first time in 20 years.

A pair of curlews had attempted to breed in 2016 - the first time since 2005 - only to fail to hatch young.

But last summer two pairs arrived back at the farm and one of the pairs successfully fledged three young.

The new chicks fledged this year will boost dwindling curlew numbers.

The bird has long been synonymous with Ireland and is often mentioned in Irish literature and songs.

However, numbers have fallen sharply.

Northern Ireland has lost more than 80 per cent of the curlew population since 1987.

And numbers have almost halved across the UK over the past two decades.

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In a warming climate, Arctic geese are rushing north

Date:  July 19, 2018

Source:  Cell Press

Summary:

As Arctic temperatures continue to rise, migratory barnacle geese have responded by speeding up their 3,000-kilometer migration in order to reach their destination more quickly with fewer stops along the way, according to new evidence. Unfortunately, the birds' earlier arrival isn't making as much of a difference as one might expect.

As Arctic temperatures continue to rise, migratory barnacle geese have responded by speeding up their 3,000-kilometer migration in order to reach their destination more quickly with fewer stops along the way, according to new evidence reported in Current Biology on July 19. Unfortunately, the birds' earlier arrival isn't making as much of a difference as one might expect. That's because, when the geese reach their Arctic breeding grounds after an accelerated marathon flight, they must take extra time to refuel their own bodies before laying eggs.

As a result of this recovery period, barnacle goose chicks continue to hatch too late to take advantage of early spring foraging opportunities. The new study shows that fewer of them are surviving long enough to leave their mothers' sides and make the trek on their own. The findings suggest that the birds are in trouble unless they start heading north for the Arctic earlier in the year, as opposed to speeding up their travel along the way, the researchers say.

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Hungry birds as climate change drives food 'mismatch'

April 23, 2018, University of Exeter

Warmer springs create a "mismatch" where hungry chicks hatch too late to feast on abundant caterpillars, new research shows.

With continued spring warming expected due to climate change, scientists say hatching of forest birds will be "increasingly mismatched" with peaks in caterpillar numbers.

The researchers, from the RSPB and the universities of Exeter and Edinburgh, used data collected across the UK—largely by citizen scientists—to study spring emergence of oak tree leaves and caterpillars, and timing of nesting by three bird species: blue tits, great tits and pied flycatchers.

They also tested a theory that some bird species in southern Britain may suffer most due to a greater mismatch effect—but they found no evidence of this.

"Forests have a short peak in caterpillar abundance, and some forest birds time their breeding so this coincides with the time when their chicks are hungriest," said Dr. Malcolm Burgess, of the University of Exeter and the RSPB.

"With spring coming earlier due to climate change, leaves and caterpillars emerge earlier and birds need to breed earlier to avoid being mismatched.

"We found that the earlier the spring, the less able birds are to do this.

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Baby albatross dead after mother attacks it leaving it with unrecoverable injuries

19/02/2018

A baby albatross has died after it was attacked by its mother who left it with unrecoverable injuries.

The Royal cam albatross, which was just under a month old, died after it was attacked by its mother at the Otago Peninsula Royal Albatross Centre in Dunedin on Sunday night. 

Webcam footage shows the mother bird attacking her chick, leaving it with injuries it could not recover from, the Department of Conservation (DoC) says. 

"Aggression by adults and juveniles towards chicks has been seen previously but this is unusual behaviour and the Department is uncertain why the attack occurred," DoC Threatened Species ambassador Nicola Toki says.

It has already been a tough breeding season for the colony due to hot weather putting the birds under stress, Ms Toki says. 

"This chick was one of only 16 to hatch this year, as Dunedin's unusually hot summer has been putting the birds under a great deal of stress. With these low numbers, the death of the 'Royal cam' chick is a serious loss to the fragile colony - the only mainland colony of albatross in the Southern Hemisphere."

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Duck bill’s sensitive touch develops in the egg

By Roni Dengler Nov. 6, 2017 , 3:00 PM

The bills of even newly hatched ducks might be as sensitive as our hands, as touch sensors in their beaks are as abundant as those in our fingertips and palms. That’s the takeaway of new research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that describes the origins of touchiness in the common duck’s quacker. Researchers knew that duck bills can sense light touch but have muted responsiveness to temperature. This comes in handy (or bill-y) since the birds forage for food in cold, murky bottom waters. Now, researchers find the sensors duck bills use to perceive touch work even before hatching. 

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Stress in the nest can have lifelong effect

Date: August 16, 2017

Source: The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)

Summary:

Why do some sparrows hatch six chicks while others don’t hatch any? How does upbringing affect the remainder of their lives? Physiological stress in the nest can actually affect birds’ DNA and possibly their lifespan.

continued

Young birds less honest when competing against siblings

Date: November 8, 2016

Source: University of Oxford

Chicks that are competing with siblings or whose parents are likely to die or switch partners tend to be less honest when begging for food, research into sibling rivalry in birds by Oxford University scientists has found.

That's because these events introduce conflict into the family group.

Analysis of more than 100 studies across 60 species of bird also found that chicks are more likely to exaggerate their need for food if their parents are likely to breed again in the future -- backing up existing evolutionary theory about natural selection.

The results are published in the journal PNAS.

Co-author Shana Caro, a doctoral candidate in Oxford's Department of Zoology, said: 'We hypothesised that you could explain the relative levels of honesty among chicks across species based on how much conflict exists. A chick that has the nest to itself is always going to get the worm, but if you add other chicks then there is going to be conflict over food resources.

'We wanted to see whether dishonesty increases as the number of siblings sharing a nest increases.'

The researchers mathematically analysed 108 scientific studies featuring information relating to the begging behaviour of chicks across 60 species. They took into account factors such as birds' condition, number of siblings, and relatedness to siblings.

Shana Caro said: 'We found that offspring are less honest about their need for food when they face competition from current siblings, when their parents are likely to breed again, and when parental divorce or death means any future siblings can only be half, not full, siblings. In short, anything that brings in conflict is detrimental to honesty. Over millions of years, natural selection has caused species with higher levels of conflict to evolve chicks that beg for food even when they don't need it.'

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Stolen African penguin's chicks die at South African marine park

Father of the two chicks was stolen from Port Elizabeth’s Bayworld marine park as a protest against animals being kept in captivity

Adam Vaughan

Friday 30 September 2016 13.10 BST Last modified on Friday 30 September 2016 22.00 BST

The two chicks of an endangered African penguin that was stolen from a marine park in South Africa have died.

Buddy the penguin was taken from Bayworld in Port Elizabeth by two men in a protest against animals being kept in captivity, but staff warned he was ill-equipped to survive in the wild.

Dylan Bailey, a Bayworld curator, confirmed “with great sadness” on Friday that the chicks that Buddy and his mate Francis had been looking after had both perished. The park said the cause of death was yet to be established.

The South African police service told the Guardian that the two suspects – named as Adrian Donian, 22, and Emile Du Plessis, 24 – had handed themselves into police on Thursday.

They were charged for malicious damage to property and theft and released on warning after appearing at Port Elizabeth magistrates court on the same day. The case is postponed for one month pending further investigation, the police said.

Bayworld urged members of the public to look out for Buddy, who has a tag on his flipper with the numbers 2-6-6.

“We are still looking for Buddy, it is fair to say it is unlikely he will be spotted but we are not ready to give up hope just yet,” said Bailey.


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Devotion to rearing chicks can come at a cost for migratory birds

Date: August 30, 2016

Birds that have to work harder during breeding season will feel the effects of their exertions the following year, according to research by Oxford University scientists.

A new study published in the Journal of Animal Ecology found that migratory seabirds suffered negative repercussions when they had to spend more time rearing chicks, including decreased breeding success when they returned to the colony the following spring.

The study artificially altered the length of the chick-rearing period for pairs of Manx shearwaters, giving new insights into the consequences for birds whose reproductive phase doesn't go to plan. All parent pairs involved in the study cared for their foster chicks until they were fully reared -- often at their own expense.

Lead author Dr Annette Fayet, of the Oxford Navigation Group in the University of Oxford's Department of Zoology, said: 'The results of this study provide evidence for carry-over effects on the subsequent migratory, wintering and breeding behaviour of birds.'

Carry-over effects are the processes by which events in one breeding season may affect the outcome of the subsequent season. But the exact nature of these effects, as well as whether they affect other events in birds' annual cycles, such as migration and wintering, has been unclear.

Dr Fayet said: 'Birds that had their chick-rearing period extended in our study delayed the start of their autumn migration and spent less time at the wintering grounds, and while they were there they spent less time resting. When they returned to the colony the following spring, they started breeding later, laid smaller eggs, reared lighter chicks -- early, heavy chicks survive better -- and overall had a lower breeding success.

'This suggests that the birds were in poorer condition after working harder during the experimental breeding season and shows the negative effects on both non-breeding and breeding behaviour in the year following the experiment.'

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Monster slugs are attacking birds in Europe

Slugs aren't usually considered predators.

BRYAN NELSON

August 29, 2016, 5:28 p.m.

Death by slug: It's not a good way to go, but that's exactly what's happening to baby birds in Poland. Researchers there have witnessed a surprising pattern of large slugs of the Arion genus crawling into the nests of birds and eating the hatchlings alive,reports New Scientist.

A trail of slime is the only evidence remaining from such attacks. The behavior is so unusual that the birds' parents don't even try to defend them, possibly because they don't see the slugs as a threat until it's too late. One parent bird was even witnessed incubating a slug feeding on its dead chicks.

“The actual moment of slugs predating on nestlings isn’t easy to observe,” explained Katarzyna Turzańska from the University of Wroclaw in Poland, one of the researchers in the study. "You are more likely to come across the traces of the ‘tragedy’: dead or alive nestlings with heavy injuries, covered in slime – and often slugs’ droppings found nearby."

The researchers' work appeared in the Journal of Avian Biology.

Turzańska and colleague Justyna Chachulska have been researching this behavior since they observed it for the first time while studying whitethroat birds near Wroclaw, in Poland. Although predation by slugs has been recorded before across Europe, almost all of these reports pertain to bird species that nest close to the ground. That giant slugs would seek out treetop-nesting birds as food is a surprise, however. It appears unprecedented.

Slugs in the Arion genus can grow quite large, and they'll eat almost anything. While most slugs spend their time dining on leaves and rotting plants, they have been known to devour earthworms and other smaller slugs. Decomposing animals are certainly on the menu as well. And, apparently, now they've expanded their appetite to include live chicks.

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Quality of environment explains why some birds choose to neglect their hungriest chicks

March 30, 2016

Scientists have long been aware that in some species of bird, parents will prioritise feeding the neediest chicks, whereas in others they will focus on the strongest offspring. Until now, though, the reason behind this discrepancy has remained a mystery.

A comprehensive new study from the University of Oxford finds that the quality of the local environment can explain which chicks in a nest a parent bird decides to feed. This helps resolve a long-standing question in ecology about whether parents respond to signals of need (such as how much a chick begs) or signals of quality (such as a chick's colour) when making feeding decisions.

For example, species living in favourable, predictable environments (such as tree swallows in North America) choose to feed begging chicks that are in poorer condition relative to their siblings, whereas parent birds in unfavourable, unpredictable environments (such as blue-footed boobies in the Galápagos Islands) preferentially feed chicks that are in the best condition, regardless of how much other siblings in the nest beg.

The study is published in the journal Nature Communications.

Shana Caro, a PhD student in Oxford's Department of Zoology who led the research, said: 'There have been hundreds of studies looking at the phenomenon of begging in birds, many of which have found strange results and contradictory patterns.

'Our analysis of these studies found that there is a universal explanation for these discrepancies: the predictability and quality of the local environment.'

The researchers compiled the available literature – more than 300 studies – on the parental care preferences during feeding of 143 bird species across the globe and analysed how this variation in care relates to the condition and behaviour of offspring, as well as the environmental conditions in the area in which each species is found.

Shana Caro said: 'In good ecological conditions, such as those with predictable and abundant sources of food, you tend to find that the chicks in greatest need of food make the most noise and do the most begging.

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