Rédaction Africa Links 24 with Sarah Jane Lebrasse
Published on 2024-02-28 13:00:47
The Grosse Cateau Verte, Mauritius Parakeet or Echo Parakeet (Alexandrinus eques) is one of the nine remaining endemic terrestrial birds of Mauritius. An iconic species, being the last parakeet remaining in the Mascarene Islands, it was on the brink of extinction in the 1990s. In fact, there were only about twenty individuals left in the wild.
After an intensive captive breeding and release program spread over nearly fifteen years, the species was saved from the immediate threat of extinction. Thanks to conservation efforts led by the National Parks and Conservation Service (NPCS) and the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation (MWF), the Black River Gorges National Park now counts between 700 and 800 individuals.
However, the species is still not out of danger and faces threats such as introduced exotic predators including wild cats, mongooses, rats, monkeys, and martins, lack of breeding sites, habitat degradation leading to competition for food resources, a disease transmitted by a virus, Psittacine Beak and Feather Disease (PBFD), and a tendency for birds to flock together leading to a denser population, exacerbating competition and disease spread.
To address these problems, the proposed solution was to create new sub-populations of the species away from the National Park, and the MWF initiated releases of the Grosse Cateau Verte in Ferney Valley in 2015 and Ebony Forest in 2018. This approach should allow young individuals to colonize new areas and expand the population at lower densities, reducing the effects of competition and virus transmission.
Ebony Forest, an organization established in 2005, working on forest restoration and also engaged in the conservation of Mauritius’ endemic fauna since 2019 continues this work in the Chamarel region. Two releases of the Grosse Cateau Verte were conducted in 2022 and 2023 totaling 29 juveniles, and the third release took place in two parts this year, on February 20 and 27, with seventeen individuals released.
For this third event, radio tracking tags were installed on about ten juveniles, allowing the Ebony Forest conservation team to monitor them in the forest. These tags, sponsored by the company HOLOHIL, will help better understand the species by determining their movements and preferred areas, a study that will be useful for future releases.
Read the original article(French) on Le Mauricien
