Hornbill Conservation Initiative Launched in Tamil Nadu to Combat Habitat Loss

In the early 2000s, when research on hornbills in the Western Ghats had just begun in South India, much of the blame for the dwindling numbers was placed on poaching by tribal communities.

Some published research papers also said the same. However, later research showed that the real reason for the decline was the loss of the forest itself.“Destruction of large trees, cavities of which hornbills need for nesting caused the decline,” says Amitha Bachan K H, founder of the Western Ghats Hornbill Foundation. “These trees were not felled by tribes but for policy reasons, and by the timber industry. The British also felled trees for teak plantations, and several dams came up in the areas.”

Research and continuous monitoring over 15 years proved that the birds need at least 250 hectares of forest to thrive.In a step toward preserving biodiversity, the Tamil Nadu forest department recently launched the hornbill conservation initiative at Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR), Pollachi division. The initiative includes the establishment of a centre of excellence at Attakatti in the Valparai range, which focuses on hornbill research, habitat restoration and community engagement.

“In Oct, hundreds of hornbills congregate in Valparai, from Kerala, as it’s the time fig trees bear fruit,” says G Venkatesh, former forest range officer of the Valparai range. “It’s also their mating season. The conservation centre will raise awareness about hornbill conservation among tourists and photographers who visit the area during this time.”Earlier, conservation used to be centred around protected areas, but the centre will ensure it gets extended to private estates as well, where it will be incentivised.

The centre will also focus on identification of habitat and host tree species, and distribution mapping, and surveys of fig trees.Tamil Nadu is home to four hornbill species: great hornbill (Buceros bicornis), Malabar pied hornbill (Anthracoceros coronatus), Indian grey hornbill (Anthracoceros albirostris) and the Malabar grey hornbill (Ocyceros griseus).“Except for the Indian grey hornbill, which is also found in drier parts of India, the rest are seen in tropical evergreen forests of South India, up to 1,500m elevation,” says Divya Mudappa of Nature Conservation Foundation (NCF), who researches hornbills.“Anamalai is one of the best places to find the great hornbill in Tamil Nadu while the Bhavani area or the foothills of Eastern Ghats, is home to the Malabar pied hornbill, specifically along the riverine forest below 600m.”Hornbills lay only one or a maximum of two eggs in a year during the nesting season, says Bachan. “Only one hatches, usually, unless the forests are of quality and conducive to nesting. Avoiding human presence during mating season is critical.

At the same time, there are no predators either for the hornbill.” A few years ago, the foundation started involving the Kadar tribes of the Western Ghats in monitoring nests. “These tribes consider hornbills as the ‘king of birds’ and they have evolved traditional methods of conserving hornbills which we incorporated,” says Bachan. “For example, the height of nesting trees was estimated using the Kadar tribe’s traditional method of counting the number of bamboo nails needed to climb a tree.

The methods was found to be accurate.”Campaigns were held to spread awareness on the need to conserve hornbills in their villages in Kerala and at present, nearly 45 members from the Kadar tribe are actively involved in the monitoring. “They are a tribe endemic to Anamalai. There have been less than a handful of cases of the birds being poached by the Kadar tribes after 2007,” says Bachan.Hornbills play a vital ecological role in seed dispersal and forest regeneration.

“Larger hornbills eat fruits while smaller ones eat insects and smaller reptiles, frogs and lizards. Hornbills are called farmers of the forest because they are good dispersers of seeds. Different species have been recorded dispersing at least 70 species of fruits,” says Divya.Less than 10% of the Western Ghats comes under protected area. “The rest of the forest outside has been fragmented and converted to plantations such as that of cashew.

Habitat segregation, fragmentation and loss are the culprits for the dwindling number of birds, besides climate change,” says Rohit Naniwadekar, scientist at NCF. Conservation centres should study the kind of stress that climate change has on hornbills and their food plants, and how forests can be restored so that they can have their homes in the long term. They should gather more knowledge that can be of conservation relevance, he adds. “They can also start long-term monitoring of hornbills at key sites, think of interventions such as nest boxes, and create models for conservation.” Coordination between Kerala and Tamil Nadu govts is also crucial, since a major chunk of their habitat falls under the Kerala forest division.