Ahmedabad: Gujarat’s efforts to bring the Great Indian Bustard back from the brink have received a much-needed boost. Wildlife Institute of India has confirmed that a chick hatched in Kutch on May 21 is male — the first known male bird recorded in the state since Dec 2018. The development comes at a crucial time for Gujarat, where the GIB population has dwindled from more than 50 birds in the late 1990s to just three adult females in the Naliya grasslands of Kutch. With no known adult male remaining, the prospects of natural breeding had become bleak.State forest and environment minister Arjun Modhwadia and principal chief conservator of forests Jaipal Singh confirmed the development. “The chick born on May 21 was a male. This is an encouraging sign for the state’s conservation efforts,” Modhwadia said.The male chick is the second to hatch under Gujarat’s ‘jump-start’ initiative, which involves replacing an infertile egg in a wild female GIB’s nest with a fertile egg brought from Rajasthan. The female then incubates the egg and raises the chick in its natural surroundings, with minimal human intervention.The first chick under the initiative, which hatched on March 24, went missing after 24 days. However, the second chick, born on May 21, survived the crucial first 40 days and has since crossed the three-month mark.Forest officials monitoring the chick said it has shown encouraging growth and is now capable of flying distances of up to 600 metres. Its head and neck plumage has also turned distinctly whiter, indicating male characteristics.Meanwhile, the state forest department is preparing to bring GIB chicks from Rajasthan to a newly developed soft-release centre in Naliya by the end of the year.Officials said the infrastructure is in place though the centre is not yet fully operational. The centre will provide a controlled environment where chicks brought from Rajasthan can adapt to the local habitat and develop survival skills before being released into the wild.“The centre has been created according to the standards of the Wildlife Institute of India. It is not fully functional yet, but the work is almost complete. We are hopeful of getting chicks during the current breeding season,” a senior forest official said.GIB is listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. Habitat loss and other threats have pushed the species close to extinction. While the confirmation of a male chick marks an important step for Gujarat, forest officials acknowledge that rebuilding a sustainable breeding population will require continued conservation measures and close monitoring of the birds.
