Mabula Southern Ground Hornbill
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Mabula Southern Ground Hornbill
The charismatic Southern Ground-Hornbill (Bucorvus leadbeateri) is a bird that many people already know well. They are culturally important as the ‘thunder' or 'rain’ birds and are a flagship species for the savannah biome (along with cheetah, white rhino and several vulture species).
At present, Southern Ground-Hornbills are considered internationally as ‘Vulnerable’ throughout their range in Africa by the IUCN, but within South Africa and Namibia they have been classified as ‘Endangered', with their numbers outside of formally protected areas are still declining.
It is estimated that there are only about 1500 – 2000 Ground-Hornbills left in South Africa, of which only a third are safe within the protected areas of the greater Kruger National Park. The birds live in social, cooperatively breeding groups that consist of between two to nine birds (mean group size 3.6), but with only one alpha male and one breeding female per group and the rest of the group as helpers. This means there are only an estimated 400 – 500 breeding groups in the whole of South Africa, while data from the Kruger National Park shows that, on average, only one chick is raised successfully to adulthood every nine years.
The reasons for their decline are predominantly secondary poisoning when farmer use bait for so-called pest species, persecution for breaking windows, electrocution, trade and loss of nests.
The Mabula Ground-Hornbill Project is working to slow their decline by:
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Harvesting and assisting the hand-rearing of redundant second-hatched chicks that naturally die of starvation in the wild nests.
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Re-wilding of the hand-reared chicks by established groups in ‘bush’ training schools.
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Reintroduction of these ‘rescued’ birds back into areas where they have become locally extinct, once the original threats in those areas have been mitigated.
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Augmentation of non-viable groups in the wild.
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Provision of artificial nests for wild groups with no or inadequate nests.
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Research on genetics, behaviour and other important unanswered questions necessary for successful re-establishment.
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Coordination of awareness campaigns, to educate the general public to the threats facing this flagship indicator species and to reinstate the bird into collective memory in areas where it has become locally extinct.
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For more information, click here to visit their latest newsletter
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