Learning to fly: A stork’s story

“It is growing up to be a beautiful bird,” beams Dr Reetika Maheshwari, assistant veterinarian at CWRC, who has been looking after the stork helping out the centre veterinarian, Dr Abhijit Bhawal.

“It is learning to fly now. Its enclosure is built around a tree and there are raised platforms of various heights and material for it to practice. It is now able to jump on to the lowest platform – a bamboo placed four feet from the ground. We will be adding on another bamboo platform in a few days too,” she adds.

The greater adjutant stork (Leptoptilus dubius) is among the rarest of the 20 storks species found in the world. With a global population of less than 1000, and decreasing, spread in two major main nesting sites in (650-800) Assam in India, and in (150-200) Cambodia, the stork is listed as endangered in the IUCN Red List.

Another breeding population of the greater adjutant stork was discovered in Bihar by expert Arvind Mishra, collaborating with WTI on Rapid Action Projects to survey and protect the storks.

“Loss of wetland habitat, pollution, direct felling of nesting trees, are some of the reasons for their decline,” says Dr Rathin Barman, a wetland expert and Senior Advisor, WTI. “In Assam, there are also multiple cases of nest-fall due to storms, and in certain areas, hostility from locals leading to their displacement or death.”

The CWRC and its satellite stations across Assam have attended to 10 cases of greater adjutant storks and 74 cases of lesser adjutants over the past decade. Most admitted, were either fledglings that had fallen off their nests, or adults injured by people or stray dogs.

Being scavengers, adjutant storks living in human-dominated landscapes depend on garbage for food. The foul smell around their nesting areas lead people to cut down the nesting trees. Yet, another example of people’s growing intolerance and change of attitude towards wildlife.

“Brahmaputra Valley is its stronghold as 80% of its global population is found here. People must know this and pride themselves in this fact and protect these birds in their vicinity,” adds Dr Barman.

There have been several success stories of rehabilitation of the greater adjutant storks from CWRC. The last case was another nest-fall victim from Morigaon district, which was admitted in January last year. The chick was hand-raised, nursed and released in September.

As the current individual at CWRC learns to fly, WTI works to ensure that the stork’s story continues.

In addition to rescue and rehabilitation, WTI has also assisted the Assam Forest Department, collaborating with various local organisations through six Rapid Action Projects to spread awareness among locals and protect nesting sites of these birds in various parts of Assam as well as in Bihar.

These RAPs were conducted with the support of the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation (DSWF) and samaritans including Sriram Srinivasan, Kannan Jayaram and Vivek Ganguly.