Category: Uncategorized

Authors: Julia Migné (Chester Zoo, UK) and Lucia Schröder (Cologne Zoo, Germany)

As you might know, consumption of wild-caught South-east Asian Songbirds for trade, as pets, singing competitions, status symbols, religious ceremonies, traditional medicine and food are pushing many species to the brink of extinction. Zoos across Europe have joined forces to help tackle this crisis through the Silent Forest Campaign.

This year, the campaign participants are redoubling the efforts and celebrating International Songbird Day on 13 May with a wide range of activities in support of the campaign!

After having heard the finest of European singing at the Eurovision contest the day before, we will add to the singing frenzy for another day and will raise awareness about the Songbird crisis.

Cologne Zoo started the festivity on 6 May.

Starting before opening time, the participants enjoyed the special early morning atmosphere during an early bird guided tour to observe native songbirds with field guides, Members of bird life Germany (NABU).

The visitors could then take part in creative activities, such as face-painting, sheet coloring and mask hand-crafting, or behind the scenes guided tours to visit the breeding aviaries. Information about the campaign, “crazy birds” and native birds were available.

Art was predominant during the day. The artist Rolf Jahn painted his “crazy birds” on a wall as a permanent artwork. Tattoo artists from four studios immortalized bird passion in a very original way and generously donated their fees to the Silent Forest campaign. Uwe Reetz – singer, songwriter and animator – performed, in a German version, the beautiful songbird song from Ashley Fayth, in cooperation with Chester Zoo.

6300 visitors attended the event! What a success!

Next week-end, Songbird Day will be celebrated in several institutions.

On Sunday 13 from 10 am to 5 pm, Heidelberg Zoo will be offering information, activities, games and fun around Bird conservation and the Silent Forest campaign. Bird stickers will be distributed against a donation. Visitors will be able to stick them onto a large Rainforest wall so that hopefully, at the end of the campaign, the symbolic forest will be full of birds again!

From Sunday 13 to Friday 18 May, Chester Zoo is organizing activities to learn more about illegal bird markets and the different conservation actions in the zoo and in the Asian field (see detailed schedule below).

Many more zoos participate to the Silent Forest Campaign, don’t hesitate to visit your favorite zoo’s website or Facebook page to see if activities are organised next week-end.

 

Author: Maria Antonieta Costa (Lisbon Zoo, Portugal)

Lisbon ZOO challenged a class of 12^th graders from the Secondary Art School António Arroio in Lisbon – finalist students of the Communication Design Course – during their Training in Work Context to imagine ways to raise awareness of the Songbird crisis.

The challenge was to present a leaflet for visitors illustrating a story that will be the basis of the campaign activities in the zoo.

After a session on zoo’s conservation work and Songbirds, as well as a visit at the zoo to observe birds, the students worked on the proposals.

In addition to creating amazing stories, they surprised us with beautiful serigraphs for each of the species whose sale will revert to the campaign!

Congratulations to all of them for this great initiative!

 

Author: Newquay Zoo, United Kingdom

One of the most endangered songbirds in the world has arrived at Newquay Zoo. The Cornish charity zoo is one of only five collections in Europe where Javan green magpies can be seen, making them the rarest species at the zoo.

Native to Java, in Indonesia, the Javan green magpie maintains its vibrant green feathers through a diet rich in vitamins and pigments like luteins. Senior Bird Keeper Gary Ward: “The most important challenge in caring for the green magpies is making sure the insects they eat are loaded with the correct amount of luteins and nutrients to keep their feathers that lovely green.” These magpies are omnivorous –they like a bit of ripe papaya along with insects and mice.

Part of the Corvid family and closely related to crows, the Javan green magpie has a very extensive vocabulary, making it a prime target for the trade in songbirds. Ward: “I hear a different call from them every day, they’re amazing, noisy birds.”

As a result of ongoing trapping pressure from the songbird trade and suitable habitat lost to palm oil plantations, the population of this species is falling at an alarming rate. Its future is likely to be in zoos.   Newquay Zoo’s latest exhibit ‘Gems of the Jungle’ has been created to highlight the issues surrounding the caged bird trade.

The Zoo hopes to help the Javan green magpie by breeding this pair. Although they are currently not old enough, Ward comments: “I’ve noticed them beginning to dance around one another, a sign of courting, so hopefully they could breed soon. We will provide her with the materials she needs to build a nest in the hope that we can begin to play our part in the conservation of this magnificent species. It is imperative that we learn about these birds to prevent their extinction.”

Authors: Jan Kužník (Technet.cz, Prague, Czech Republic) and Matyáš Adam (Zoo Liberec, Czech Republic)

Birds, insects, hedgehogs, frogs, wildlife. Thousands of animals on Slow Radio http://www.slowradio.cz/en.

After the winter break, Slow Radio starts again. It broadcasts live, continuously and through professional microphones from a secret place in the middle of a bird paradise in southern Bohemia. Listen to it from your desktop or mobile phone.

Slow Radio started to broadcast last spring in cooperation with Technet.cz and the Czech Society for Ornithology. Thanks to the Silent Forest Campaign, that became a partner of the project this year, Slow Radio can cross the Czech borders and people from around the world will be able to listen to our Songbirds.

The best listening is always early in the morning when nature wakes up or in the evening before the birds pause. At night, listening changes literally to a horror radio drama without words.

When listening to the radio, you can think about the state of our nature. Slow Radio is evidence that there are still places in our country where nature is the dominant, but it is not completely free from the noise caused by human activity. You will sometime hear human voices and the noise of cars, aircraft or agricultural machines. Although the main road is many kilometers away from the broadcasting station, you can hear the truck over the loud voices of the Songbirds.

Silence is never part of the forest.

The sensitive microphones do not only record birds singing, but also all possible sounds – the movement of millions of leaves and twigs in the breeze or wind, the buzzing of hundreds of thousands of flies, mosquitoes, beatles, the rustle of various animals in leaves and grasses … and, of course, drops of rains or sound of thunder.

Put your headphones on and step into the Czech Republic forests…

Since 2008, the Future for Nature foundation has supported 30 successful conservationists all around the world, each passionately working on environmental protection, and with result. Besides supporting these remarkable people financially, FFN also want to provide a platform to showcase their work and studies and open doors towards a broader network.

On April 20 2018 three young, promising, international conservationists, determined to make a difference and ensure a brighter future for nature, will receive the Future For Nature Awards in Royal Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, this year awarded for the eleventh time. Besides the award itself, each of them receives €50.000 to use to continue their work. This year’s winners each contribute to topical and crucial theme’s in international conservation:

• Adam Miller (27), a young American trying to stop the illegal bird trade in Borneo, Indonesia
• Trang Nguyen (27), an adventurous woman form Vietnam fighting a dangerous battle against illegal wildlife trade in Africa and Asia
• Geraldine Werhahn (33), a Swiss researcher who traded her home country for the mountains of Tibet and Nepal in order to protect an elusive wolf species.

These exceptional individuals operate without boundaries and sometimes despite of great risks for themselves and their international colleagues. All of them actively try to involve the local communities in their plans, thus encouraging them to change their ways. With their innovative approach they successfully motivate people to protect those parts of nature they once threatened.

Adam Miller (27) is originally for the United States, but ended up founding the local NGO Planet Indonesia in Borneo, Indonesia. Besides succeeding in gathering more intel about the illegal bird trade in the rainforest -and sometimes actually bringing the people who practice this to justice- Adam is also actively involved in reforestation projects and the founding of ranger patrol teams. Adam’s efforts made it possible for the severely endangered orangutan to move from one side of their habitat to the other, using the reforested areas. On top of this, Adam makes an effort to involve the local communities in his projects, tries to convince bird traders to pursue a new career and works towards illegalizing the opening of new bird shops.

 

Congratulations to Cologne Zoo, Germany, for their significant involvement in the Silent Forest Campaign!

This time, it is via colorful articles in the Kölner Zoo Magazin (edition Summer 2018) that they raise awareness of Southeast Asian Songbirds status but also of their European counterparts situation. They especially talk about the Bird of the year 2018: the Common starling (Sturnus vulgaris).

German speakers, you can read the complete magazine here.

Also have a look at page 11, listing all the Bird-related events happening in Cologne Zoo in 2018!

 

No need to be a big zoo or non-profit organization to raise awareness for wildlife conservation and help fight the Songbirds crisis: meet Alyssa Rice and her amazing All the birds project.

Passionate about animals, Alyssa promotes conservation through her drawings. She suggested three conservation projects to her followers who voted for the Silent Forest Campaign! We are so grateful for that! Thank you so much!

The very realistic and super cute illustrations of Birds are based on the most recent International Ornithological Committee Life List+.

Alyssa sends stickers and prints of her drawings against donations, that will be generously offered to the campaign.

Donations can be made until the 20^th of April 2018, please find all the information here.

 

What a great initiative!

 

 

 

 

Author: Ruth Dieckmann (Cologne Zoo, Germany)

The 20^th of March 2018 is World Sparrow Day!

Sparrows are in serious decline in Europe, not because of the Asian Songbird Crisis or trade but because of their decreasing access to food and nesting grounds near Human settlements.

 

In Germany, the populations of House sparrows (Passer domesticus) have declined by 30% on average. In some cities, it is even by more than 50% over the past 25 years.

 

Zoos often provide better living spaces and the ground of zoo’s sometimes holds above average densities of Sparrows similar to the way populations were several decades ago.

 

Together with local environmental authorities, the local birdlife partner Cologne Zoo started a very successful Sparrow project last year as a part of the previous EAZA campaign “Let it Grow”.

A photo competition, an exhibition about sparrows, plantings in schoolyards, building nesting boxes and a children’s book about the life of a Sparrow are some of the activities achieved. The project was recently certificated as UN project on Biodiversity.

Wouldn’t it be great if more zoos presented their projects for Sparrows next year on the 20^th of March?

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

Even though the whole world seems to be skyping – and the campaign team certainly does quite regularly skype with each other – a face to face meeting every once in a while is really useful, too. Unfortunately, travelling across Europe to see each other is rather time-consuming, costly and not too great for our CO2 footprint. All arguments for ourselves and for our directors to keep the number of factual meetings low.

But, when a few of us come together anyway for another meeting, we surely take our chance to stick our heads together and discuss.
Lately, such an opportunity arose during the ‘German speaking zooeducators conference’ (in short VZP, which is of course an abbreviation that absolutely makes no sense in English!), in the Northwestern city of Nordhorn. Almost a hundred zooeducators gathered at Nordhorn zoo for a three days meeting. Amongst them, three educators active in the specialist group for the Silent Forest Campaign.

Lucia from Cologne zoo gave a talk on the campaign during the conference. After the official part with presentations and workshops, we quickly met to chat by. Nicolina from Karlsruhe Zoo created bird masks, drawings and material to be used in schools. Also, she has written down an interview with a conservationist busy at the bird rescue and breeding centre Cikananga on Java. That interview will be placed on the website soon.

We discussed the reaction of our education colleagues on the campaign and brainstormed about further steps in creating and translating material as well as evaluating zoo visitors’ knowledge about the campaign’s focus species and goals.

So, even if it rather seems quiet from our group at the moment: be sure that still a lot is going on behind the scenes!

Author: Simon Bruslund (Heidelberg Zoo, Heidelberg, Germany)

The Erfurt Museum of Natural History, Germany, is presenting an exhibition about illegal bird trapping and have included extensive information on the Silent Forest Campaign. For this purpose, the Museum signed up as a non-EAZA participant to the campaign in preparation of the exhibition. This is an excellent showcase of not only the Asian Songbird Crisis but also of how Songbirds were and are still being trapped right here in Europe.

Not only zoos, but other zoological institutions can participate in EAZA Conservation campaigns, and help informing the public and raising awareness about conservation issues. The exhibition called “Hunted – trapped – killed: Illegal bird-catching in Europe” at the Natural history museum of Erfurt is a perfect example of that.

As the dramatic title indicates, the exhibition mainly focuses on the problems with illegal hunting and killing of birds in the Mediterranean and other countries in Europe. In the wake of the exhibition, the Asian songbird crisis is also addressed with pictures and some of the campaign material. The world class taxidermists of the museum also prepared a singing White-rumped Shama (Kittacincla malabarica) in the setting of an original Javanese bamboo birdcage.

“We had key species of the Silent forest campaign in our collection, so it seemed appropriate to take part in the campaign” says conservation biologist Florian Schäfer, who curated the exhibition. A threaded bird species links the Asian Songbird Crises to Europe: The Yellow-breasted Bunting (Emberiza aureola), which occurs from northeastern Europe to far-eastern Asia, have shown a dramatic decline of over 90% within only 30 years throughout its range due to unsustainable trapping.

The exhibition is running from 09.02.2018 until 02.04.2018.  It’s not too late to check it out!

Author: Chris Green (Cotswold Wildlife Park, Oxfordshire, UK)

The Emei Shan Liocichla (Liocichla omeiensis) also known as Mt. Omei Babblers are one of five, restricted range, species in the genus which are among the smaller members of the Laughingthrush family.

This species is internationally protected in CITES Appendix II and also locally fully protected in the province of Sichuan. Since 1999, the export of wild birds from China has been banned, but this legislation is difficult to enforce and birds have been seen in bird markets as far away as Sumatra in recent years. This illustrates the very real need to continue working with this species in a sustainable captive breeding program.

In their natural habitat, in the sacred Omei Mountains, they are more often heard than seen. Yet, the open access paper co-authored by Simon Dowell (Chester zoo, UK) describes their nesting behaviour in the wild.

They are smallish and lively birds with a distinctive sexual dimorphism with the male’s colourful undertail-coverts. Their lovely voice is melodic and moving and is frequently heard in an aviary.

Emei Shan Liocichlas do very well in heavily planted aviaries with dense vegetation suitable for nesting. Plants such as bamboo, conifer and laurel are ideal and provide the right structure to allow the birds to build their cup-shaped nests. Nest baskets can be provided for the birds to build their nests in and they will prefer to use coconut fibre and fine grasses as nest material. These birds can be fed on a diet of good quality insectivore mix and a variety of fruit chopped into small cubes so the birds can easily swallow it. During breeding, they require supplement of good quality live food.

We currently have 20 collections holding Emei Shan Liocichlas and the population is growing. However, it is not yet demographically stable. More holders are therefore needed so breeding can continue.

There are no new institutions on this year’s waiting list yet: a perfect opportunity to add this interesting and campaign relevant species to your collection!

Dear fellow aviculturists, if you feel you can house a pair of this enigmatic babbler species please get in touch with me at chrisgreen@cotswoldwildlifepark.co.uk!

Author: Simon Bruslund (Heidelberg Zoo, Heidelberg, Germany)

When going home to Denmark for Christmas, my 7-year-old nephew begged me to visit his class and talk about Animals. Soon his older brother (12) and sister (10) did too.

As the date came closer, I started to get nervous. Is talking to kids the same as presenting to adults? What if I don’t catch their attention? What if the lecture turns into pure chaos? These were just some of the questions going through my mind. Although I am used to speaking in front of crowds (and crows) mostly in zoos and often supported by an animal behind me or on the arm, I’m not an Educator… What more my dear sister thought it was a grand idea to call the local island newspaper…

However, as I often talk about how important Environmental Education is, here I was!

My first lecture with the youngest class was on Spiders. With a few pictures (such as an oversized Heteropoda with a frog in its jaws), several fun facts and 20 out of 22 kids calling me “Uncle Simon”, I managed to make almost everyone in the room appreciate jumping spiders by the time I was done (not sure about the teacher though).

With the 10 and 12-year olds, I decided to talk about the Silent Forest campaign. I introduced the subject with the great film Tainted Love by Eleanor Paris and in my backhand the educative materials from the campaign: the origami sheets from Chester, the coloring sheets, the educative panels in different languages as well as masses of pictures, videos and PowerPoints ready to go.

I can truly say I had never been asked so many questions! I only managed to show a fraction of my materials and still we spend most of the next scheduled lecture (math) talking about Songbirds. Questions turned into a discussion and indeed, it became a dialogue more than a lecture.

Many of the things they asked I had never even thought about before. But with pictures of the main species involved and some basic facts, I could quickly provide graphic answers which seemed to satisfy the class.

I was surprised how important facts were for the kids. “How much does a White-rumped Shama cost – How much is that in crowns”, “How many people live on Java”, “How many Hill Mynas are left in the wild”, “How big is a Sumatran Laughingthrush”. I found it was important to compare the amounts and sizes to something they already know, the value of a hotdog or a house or the size of a Common Blackbird. Other questions circled around the hopelessness of the situation. “Why can we just not buy all and set them free”, “My grandpa have two Canaries can we send them to Indonesia so they don’t catch wild ones”, “Why doesn’t the police do anything”, etc. I could painfully feel the frustration if I could not provide an answer with a pinch of hope in it.

Although no one called me Uncle Simon there (not even those who are technically entitled to do so), all the children were thinking about Songbirds and how to save them during at least these 90 minutes. The newspaper reporter was also clearly impressed as she managed to fill a full page with this experience about the Silent Forest campaign.

Altogether, my slight apprehension of the lecture turned into a lot of hope and a renewed sense of the importance of what we do in Zoos. It is crucial to keep showing kids and the public in general what is happening in the “world of the animals” … in our world.

Both classes are now still working with the Silent Forest materials and one of them convinced their music teacher to make a song “just like in Chester zoo”.

A great day for Songbirds and not a bad way to spend a day of your vacation…

 

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

Imagine a lecture hall full of people eager to learn more about the Asian songbird crises and the EAZA conservation campaign… the dream of every campaigner, the dream of every educator. On the evening of 17th of January 2018, this dream came true in Royal Burgers’ Zoo, the Netherlands. 260 listeners showed up for an evening lecture on tropical birds and the campaign.

Head Zookeeper of the world-famous Bush, Christiaan Luttenberg, warmed up the crowd with his talk on the challenges that zookeepers face in the husbandry of often rare tropical birds in a huge mixed enclosure like the Burgers’ Bush. It is the place where we keep different campaign target and focus species, like the White-rumped shama, the Asian fairy bluebird and the Blue-crowned laughingthrush. Then I was giving a talk on the campaign background, the conservation projects the campaign will collect money for and the activities we are going to enrol in the zoo for the campaign.

After the presentation, one of the listeners, a passionate birder and world traveller came up to me and said, ‘Well, I did already know that there is a bird crisis going on in Asia, but I had no idea it was this urgent to act.’

As we also sold buttons and fridge magnets with the campaign logo that evening (participants can get the mall for those buttons in the resource section of the website), we made already our first 101 Euro for the campaign!

 

 

Three smugglers were arrested on Tuesday the 16^th of January 2018 in Melaka, Malaysia, by the Malaysia’s Maritime Enforcement Agency. Unfortunately, the authorities intercepted the fleeing boat after the men had thrown overboard 300 birds. Only three of them could be saved from drowning. According to a press statement, the birds were likely smuggled over land from Viet Nam to Thailand before heading to Indonesia for sale on illegal markets. The species are currently being identified but most of them are believed to be Songbirds.

This unfortunate incident is another reminder of the significance of conservation campaigns, such as Silent Forest, launched last September by the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, TRAFFIC, BirdLife International and the IUCN Asian Songbird Trade Specialist Group. It should encourage us all to work twice as hard to inform on and fight against the trade of these iconic species.

For more information, click here.

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

Campaign wise, the last few weeks can be characterized as the crucial weeks to get zoos on board on national level. My lecture about the campaign during the Dutch zoo employee meeting (150 attendees, mostly zoo keepers) was rather successful. Of course, often the keepers are not the ones who decide whether a zoo join in a campaign. But if they see the conservation need to do so, they can urge the biologists, educators or even director of their zoo to do so!

The week after, we’ve had our national zoo-marketeer-meeting and our national zoo-educators-meeting. Very important gatherings to get more zoos signing up. I hope me marketing colleague and I could convince more zoos to participate. Not only, because the Asian songbirds do indeed need our help! But also because it makes a rather weak statement, if in a joint conservation campaign by EAZA zoos, less than half of the member zoos participate although you only thing you have to pledge for is to do at least one topic related activity in two years’ time!

The education experts under the lead of Lucia from Cologne Zoo also try to keep the EAZA education committee well informed, up-dated and involved. Those people all need to do in their country the same as I try to do in the Netherlands… and then the Silent Forest Campaign will be a great success, with many participants and vibrant activities! Let’s go for it, together!

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

The Silent Forest Campaign has been launched six weeks ago. It’s good to see how the really quick zoos registered within a few days! Wow! By now, almost 60 zoos registered as participants. Also great that quite a lot of zoos indeed pledge to raise money for the campaign. That money will really make a difference for the in situ conservation projects!

In the meantime, in my own institution, the Royal Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, we’re thinking or how to communicate the content of the campaign via the different education channels. The cheap and easy ones are really quickly realised. In January, we’ll have an evening presentation on the topic for our season card holders. I’ll talk about the campaign, our Burgers’ Bush head keeper Christiaan will tell more about the proper care of rare Asian songbirds in our large rainforest hall. I expect at least 300 listeners, as this is the average number of people showing up on the lectures.

For the younger visitors, we have planned an afternoon of the youth university in our zoo on the campaign in February. The almost ready Powerpoint presentation for primary schools (soon to be downloadable on the campaign website) is of course a good basis for this lecture. And why not take birds in general as focus for our May holiday activity? There are a lot accessible topics around birds, like feathers, beaks, reproduction, the way the communicate etc, which would nicely complete an activity about the Silent Forest campaign. The core planning group of the campaign keeps having skype meetings at least once a fortnight. Because for a campaign group, the work is absolutely not finished once a campaign is launched!

Threatened songbirds in the region will now have the voice of the first Asian Songbird Trade Specialist Group to join the chorus against the illegal and unsustainable cage bird trade.

Formally recognised by the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Species Survival Commission (IUCN SSC) in May 2017, the Asian Songbird Trade Specialist Group (ASTSG) is dedicated solely to preventing the imminent extinction of songbirds threatened by unsustainable trapping and the trade. This is the first multidisciplinary specialist group, and prior to its formation, there was no official conservation body under the IUCN SSC focusing on songbirds and the threats arising from its illegal trade.

Together with other global experts, Wildlife Reserves Singapore played a key role in driving the formation of the ASTSG – a natural progression from the Songbird Crisis Summits in 2015 and 2017— also hosted by Wildlife Reserves Singapore—and will implement the conservation strategy and action plans discussed at these important meetings. This is also the first time an institution in Singapore is hosting a specialist group under the IUCN SSC.

Southeast Asia is home to more than 850 bird species. Keeping songbirds is seen as a social status symbol, with demand also arising from cultural practices—such as religious releases and songbird competitions. As a result, the region sees huge demand for domestic and international bird trade, involving countless individuals of hundreds of species. Many of these are now facing catastrophic declines.

David Jeggo, Chair of the ASTSG said: “The songbird trade conservation issue is highly complex, with many different perspectives and challenges. A coordinated effort under this Specialist Group would create synergies by bringing together a range of subject matter experts to find solutions to reverse the growing threat to songbird species and improve the conservation status of all the species involved.”

Currently, conservation efforts are broadly centred around in situ research into wild populations; genetic research; trade monitoring and legal protection; ex situ conservation breeding programmes; and education and community engagement. These five themes form sub-groups are led by vice-chairs in the ASTSG.

• Vice-chair (Trade and Legislation) – Christopher Shepherd, Wildlife Trade Expert, Canada
• Vice-chair (Field Research) – Stuart Marsden (Manchester Metropolitan University, U.K.)
• Vice-chair (Genetics) – Frank Rheindt (National University of Singapore, Singapore)
• Vice-chairs (Ex-situ Breeding and Reintroductions) – Luis Neves (Wildlife Reserves Singapore, Singapore) & Andrew Owen (Chester Zoo, U.K.)
• Vice-chair (Education and Community Engagement) – Ria Saryanthi (Burung Indonesia, Indonesia)

Wildlife Reserves Singapore also contributes in other capacities towards songbird conservation, including education and community outreach activities, as well as through the conservation breeding of various threatened species of songbirds at Jurong Bird Park. Wildlife Reserves Singapore also supports two songbird conservation projects in Bali and Java, Indonesia, where the critically endangered songbirds are bred and reintroduced into the wild.

This press release coincides with the timely launch of European Association of Zoos and Aquaria’s two-year ‘Silent Forest’ campaign, aimed to support and raise awareness of conservation efforts of Southeast Asian songbirds threatened by trade, and by extension the ASTSG’s objectives.

The European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, together with TRAFFIC, BirdLife International and the IUCN Asian Songbird Trade Specialist Group, today launched a joint campaign in a collaborative effort to save iconic Asian songbird species from extinction.

The Silent Forest campaign will raise awareness of the devastating effects of the trade in songbirds across Southeast Asia, and will also raise funds for field conservation projects that are working to reverse the decline in numbers of some of the world’s most beautiful birds. Teetering on the brink of extinction, birds such as the Bali Myna and Javan Green Magpie are highly sought after in markets across the region. Owning a songbird has long been an integral part of Southeast Asian culture, but as the region develops, songbirds are fetching increasingly high prices in the markets, encouraging trappers to clear birds from huge areas of forest.

“The Asian songbird crisis has reached a tipping point: without immediate action, it is almost certain their voices will be silenced forever in the forest,” said Kanitha Krishnasamy, Acting Southeast Asia Regional Director of TRAFFIC, the world’s leading NGO on wildlife trafficking. “We aim to raise the profile of this crisis both in Europe and in the range States and have a plan in place, in the form of a Conservation Strategy for these birds which this campaign feeds directly into”.

“We need to establish a sustainable model that respects both local culture and laws without destroying the incredible richness of Southeast Asia’s biodiversity; that’s a formidable challenge, but this is a very strong coalition of partners, and there are some amazing projects that the campaign will support.”

Thomas Ouhel of Liberec Zoo, and Chair of the Campaign, pointed to the difference that funds raised by European zoos could make: “If we can persuade traders to work with conservationists and breeders rather than pillaging the forests, there’s a real chance to save these birds by changing attitudes towards the ownership of songbirds. Funding for the breeding and conservation projects, linked to educational work in the local communities can halt and eventually reverse the decline in songbirds species, bringing back the music of the forest for the benefit of future generations.”

Silent Forest will run for two years, and is aimed at raising €400,000 from European zoos and their visitors to help save six Critically Endangered flagship species identified by the coalition and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Leading biologists from the EAZA and beyond will also work on scientific measures to increase protection for these species. To learn more, visit www.silentforest.eu

15 September, written by Anais Tritto

The Rufous-fronted Laughingthrush used to be very common in the past in high Javan mountains and observed making large flocks and vocalizing with their typical “horse” songs (the Indonesian name for the Rufous-fronted Laughingthrush is Poksai kuda which means the “Horse Laughingthrush”).

Esa (“the only one” in Indonesian) is a Rufous-fronted Laughingthrush from the subspecies of Central Java. Although few individuals of the subspecies from West Java still remain in remote locations, the subspecies from Central Java was completely decimated by the intensive illegal catching for the cage-bird trade. This illegal trade is touching all songbirds in Indonesia that are kept in small cages in front of people houses so they can “enjoy” their songs or increase their social status by having a rare bird to show.

Esa arrived in Cikananga Conservation Breeding Centre (CCBC) in September 2012 from the biggest bird market of Java, situated in Jakarta. The CCBC team quickly identified this female as Central Java subspecies and large efforts were implemented to find new companions for her and start a breeding programme to counteract the loss of this valuable subspecies. Whereas few Rufous-fronted Laughingthrushes from the West Java subspecies were found and breeding programmes could start, no individual from the subspecies of Esa was found until now. It is thought that this subspecies is already extinct in Central Java and, since Esa, there is no evidence of another individual in captivity (private owners, centres or bird markets).

Until now, Esa is kept in CCBC under the good care of the experienced team. Unfortunately, she doesn’t have a mate but can enjoy time with young birds from the West Java subspecies until they reach their sexual maturity and have to be removed from her (to prevent hybridization).

This brown and secretive bird received few attention in the past and the Cikananga team is sad to observe daily the last specimen of its kind that will drive the subspecies to the complete extinction once Esa will pass away.

Actions to preserve the Indonesian songbirds must be implemented right now to prevent other species becoming the new “Esa” and being driven silently to extinction.

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

The EAZA Annual Conference, THE EAZA meeting of the year, the place to meet and network with 600+ relevant staff of EAZA Zoos! Also, traditionally the time and location to close one EAZA conservation campaign and launch the next one. So, this conference is a crucial moment for a campaign planning team.

However, the EAZA Annual Conference is also quite a costly meeting, to be honest. The conference fee itself is rather high, surely compared to meetings of nationwide zoo educators (which are generally free of charge for one day meetings or very low-cost for conferences that last a couple of days). Then travel, accommodation, the inconvenience of missed working hours,… no wonder that most zoos’ management send curators and/or zoological directors to those conferences only. Educators are a rare species there, even though there are closed and open education sessions.

Last March, when the educators of the preparation team met the EAZA staff during the EZE conference in Paris, Myfanwy Griffith, director of EAZA, made the remark that it is probably best if the curators of the core planning group give the campaign talk during the plenary session of the annual EAZA conference. On the one hand I was personally a bit relieved, as I did not have to ask my boss to attend yet another conference and also, I guess Myfanwy was quite right – as sad as is –  when she stated: ‘tell the directors and curators that for the education stuff is taken care; they are not interested to deeply in it anyway, as long as they know there will be material.’. On the other hand, the conference is a great possibility to talk to people in person and get them enthusiast!  And curators who also have five EEP meetings to prepare and eight TAG meetings and who want to discuss a million different things with their colleagues… might not have the upcoming conservation campaign highest ranking on their agenda, maybe; so a little pushing can’t do harm.

Not thinking about participating in this year’s annual conference any more, the following news strikes me:  the zoos of the Dutch Zoo Federation NVD decided that it might be useful and interesting for non-curators to attend one set day of the Annual Conference in Wildlands, Emmen, the North of our own home country… reduced one-day fee for the first 30 interested Dutch zoo employees; no travel expenses, no accommodation necessary. I signed up really, really quickly! Unfortunately the set date is not the one of the campaign launch. Yet, that day might be a good chance to meet the curators/directors in the campaign preparation group. There are not to many meetings in person, so it would be great to get together during the lunch eg. And  a personal target: talk to at least five non-Dutch-zoo- employees (people I would not meet so easily normally) about the campaign goals and opportunities!

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

Sometimes things turn to be out much more complicated and difficult to achieve than expected – and sometimes things work out much smoother than expected on the forehand! A nice example of this general rule in the songbird campaign context:

One possible way to spread the campaign message, so we discussed in the education preparation team, would be to get hobbyists like bird breeders  and other local bird clubs involved. Those people would could even be a key target group. As bird lovers they would care much more than average about the faith of tropical birds getting wiped out in Southeast Asia. Of course, that sounds logic and reasonable… but on the other hand: how many educators/communicators in zoos do already have warm bonds with local bird breeders, chicken fans or parrot lovers? We in Burgers’ Zoo don’t, to be honest. Nonetheless, on my ‘mental personal campaign bucket list’ I put: ‘hold at least one presentation for a local/regional bird breeders club; think about how to realize that later’.

Not having taken any action so far (‘later’ is of course a broad definition for a campaign running from September 2017 till 2019), on our monthly meeting one of my educational volunteer guides approached me. He had been asked by somebody he knows, who is member of a parrot breeder club… if he could give an evening presentation on parrots and other tropical birds of Burgers’ Zoo, next November. If that was ok with me, and if there already was a powerpoint presentation on that topic he could use? Ok? That’s more than ok with me! So I assured my volunteer colleague that he could of course confirm the presentation to the club; and that we would integrate the new EAZA songbird campaign in the talk. Additionally, the little donation he would receive for his talk would go to the campaign funds.  In my experience, a successful talk for one local department of a club often is the start for a whole series of requests for talks for groups in their network. The word will spread…  That target on my campaign bucket list can almost already be ticked off! Minor detail: in our campaign education preparation team’s list it up to me to prepare a standard powerpoint on the campaign as resource on the website! Just have to check with the team members whether we already agreed on a look and layout for that or not…

Author: Constanze Mager (Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem, The Netherlands)

It is always an interesting challenge to get an EAZA campaign – invented and launched by EAZA office and a small campaign preparation group – really alive in hundreds of EAZA institutions in 44 European countries! Actually, zoos sometimes have to be convinced to participate yet in another campaign and organize fundraising and educational activities… on top of all the ‘normal crazy everyday business’ in a modern zoo!

There are a couple of very important moments in the starting-up phase of a campaign to get zoos involved: an EZE meeting, where more than hundred educators come together from all across Europe to discuss. The annual EAZA conference, when even more (mainly) curators attend. The EAZA campaign is always planned in a plenary session of lectures. Presentations on these meetings are crucial to reach the management level of zoos and to get their attitude positive about participating in a conservation campaign. But how to reach the zookeepers as well?

In some countries, zookeepers are united in an interest group. In the Netherlands, this group is called ‘de Harpij’- which means ‘the Harpy Eagle’. It has more than a thousand members. Each November there’s a  huge annual meeting. Quite often, the EAZA conservation campaign is a theme of one of the lectures during this annual conference day. Also this year! The Netherlands of course have a special advantage over other ‘European zoo countries’: the EAZA office is situated in the Netherlands, and some of the EAZA staff are native Dutch speakers… great conditions for a contentwise fantastic story in the keepers’ own language! Unfortunately this year, EAZA office staff are unavailable during the conference date. But, bit of good luck: in the education preparation team, there’s a Dutch speaking person with podium experience… me! A little rearrangement of my own daily agenda (weird that even in July the agenda for over four or five months are already running full in some weeks!), and off I’ll go to this year’s Harpy eagle-conference, to promote the new campaign on much smaller, and to be true a bit less spectacular birds as good as possible! Hopefully, there will be more campaign-ambassadors in more European countries, so that we can get a lot of people really going for the campaign… we’ll try to get the EAZA education committee members  involved in this task!