Songbird craze pushes thrush toward extinction

Songbird craze pushes thrush toward extinction

Bambang M, Contributor, Yogyakarta

It was a sunny Sunday morning and the Babarsari camping ground in
Yogyakarta was alive with the sound of cheerful birds singing.

The birds, of course, were not there to join in the camping.
They were brought by owners to participate in a bird-singing
contest.

The competition started with the orange-headed thrush
(Zoothera cirtrina). Each participant paid Rp 75,000 as a
registration fee for their birds.

Dozens of orange-headed birds in luxurious bird cages were
hung about four meters from the ground while their owners
whistled and gestured to encourage their pets to respond with a
series of chirps.

The entire sight was unbelievable: Each bird began chirping in
their own signature singing style. They first spread their wings
and dropped their heads low while shaking their body right and
left.

"It was like they were in a trance," said Anthonie Kelik, a
bird lover from Yogyakarta.

The orange-headed thrush became popular among Indonesian bird
lovers in the 1990s. Rarely has a major bird-singing contest been
held since then.

Hobby magazines have dedicated a lot of space in their pages
to ways of raising this particular bird, with topics ranging from
where to buy it to how to teach it to sing.

The bird's natural habitat is in the forests of Sumatra,
Kalimantan and Java. An adult bird -- about 21 centimeters in
length -- is popular for its extended, beautiful notes when it
sings and its unique dance.

Like other birds, it is in high demand and sold at bird
markets in major cities.

Due to its high demand, it has become one of the most
expensive birds. A young bird, which has yet to learn to sing,
for example, can fetch up to Rp 200,000 in Yogyakarta's Ngasem
bird market. That price increases to Rp 7 million for a bird that
has won a competition.

"I bought my orange-headed thrusts for between Rp 2 million
and Rp 7 million each," said Anthonie, who owns five of the
birds.

The orange-headed thrush has rarely been seen in its natural
habitat over the last several years. In Central Java, one could
often spot the bird in the forests on the south slopes of Mt.
Merapi as they build their nests on indigenous zallaca plants
(salak pondoh).

Besides the threat of poachers, however, this bird is losing
its nesting grounds as farmers are planting a newer, higher-
yielding variety of zallaca. This change in the variety has
disturbed the birds' natural habitat.

"The salak pondoh needs more frequent fertilization and
weeding and these activities disturb the birds. They are scared
to build their nests there," said Triman Setyardi from the
Kutilang Indonesia Foundation for Bird Conservation.

The bird is also disappearing from the Kerinci Seblat
National Park in Sumatra. A survey on the birds conducted by the
Center for Environmental Studies at the Andalas University from
December 1998 until November 1999 was not able to find the
species in its former habitat. Another survey in the same park by
the bird-watching club of the Bengkulu University from November
1998 until November 1999 was not able to locate the species
either.

A relative of the orange-headed thrush, the chestnut-capped
thrush (Zoothera intepres), enjoys less popularity among bird
lovers, but it has also met with the same fate: It cannot escape
the poachers.

The shy chestnut-capped thrush is very difficult to find in
its natural habitat in Nusa Tenggara, particularly Lombok,
Flores, Sumba and Sunda Besar. This bird is also native to
Malaysia and the Philippines.

According to Birdlife Indonesia, its numbers are very low due
to excessive hunting on Sumbawa. This fact was reported by Warta
Teropong, an environmental publication, in its March/April 2002
edition.

This bird is easy to spot because of its black spots on its
white chest and stomach. It is locally called the Punglor kepala
merah (Red-headed punglor) for the ornate red feathers on its
head.

To protect its population, the then governor of West Nusa
Tenggara, Warsito, banned poaching of the bird, but the move has
not stopped its decrease in population. Even Birdlife Indonesia
has reported that the poaching has spread as far as Flores and
Sumba in East Nusa Tenggara.

While poaching of the orange-headed thrush and the chestnut-
capped thrush goes on, efforts to breed both birds in captivity
have not shown encouraging results.

"It's more difficult to breed insect-eating birds than seed-
eating ones," said Sri Panuju Karso, a famous bird breeder from
Kulonprogo, Yogyakarta.

Environmentalists have called on the government to legally
protect the birds. But the call has met with a cold response from
a local forestry official.

"It is easy to declare these birds a protected species because
that would require a ministerial decree. But scientific research
is needed to determine if the birds deserve the (protected)
status," said Kuspriyadi, the head of the Yogyakarta provincial
agency for conservation.

But Hartono from the Yogyakarta-based Kutilang Indonesia
Foundation for Bird Conservation insisted that legal protection
was necessary.

"We need a law to take action against the poachers," he said
in a recent seminar on conservation at Gadjah Mada University.

Indonesia boasts 1,539 species of birds and the thrushes are
but two of the scores of protected species.

Authors John McKinnon, Karen Phillips and Bas Van Balen in
their book titled Burung-Burung di Sumatera, Kalimatan dan Jawa,
(Birds of Sumatra, Kalimantan and Java) said there are eight
thrush species living on these islands. They are the chestnut-
capped thrush, the orange-headed thrush, Everett's thrush
(Zoothera everetti), the sunda thrush (Zoothera andromedae), the
siberia thrush (Zothera sibrica), the scaly thrush (Zoothera
dauma), the eyebrowed thrush (Turdus obscurus) and the island
thrush (Turdus poliocephalus).

But Brian J. Coates and K. David Bishop, the writers of a
book that has been translated into Indonesian Panduan Lapangan
Burung-Burung di Kawasan Wallacea (Sulawesi, Maluku dan Nusa
Tenggara) said that there are at least 14 species of the thrush
family in the territory. Some are also found on Sumatra,
Kalimantan and Java. The 13 species are the sangihe shike thrush
(Colluricincla sanghirensis), geomalia thrush (Geomalia
heinrichi), the slaty-backed thrush (Zoothera schistacea), the
maluku thrush (Zoothera dumasi), the nusa tenggara thrush
(Zoothera dohertyi), the red-backed thrush (Zoothera thronota),
the timor thrush (Zoothera peronis), the sunda thrush (Zoothera
andromedae), the scaly thrush (Zoothera dauma), the fawn-breasted
thrush (Zoothera machiki), the sulawesi thrush (Cataponera
turdoides), the island thrush (Turdus poliocephalus) and the
eyebrowed thrush (Turdus obscurus).