Article 2: Bird islands
Why in news: The Great Indian Bustard conservation programme has released two captive-bred birds in Rajasthan, highlighting both progress in species recovery and the need for landscape-level conservation.
Key Details
- Population recovery: The conservation programme now covers 97 birds, including 57 captive-bred birds, which produced 29 chicks this year and 24 last year.
- Long-term decline: The population fell from around 1,260 in 1969 to about 120 today, mainly due to hunting, habitat loss and infrastructure expansion.
- Power-line threat: High-voltage transmission lines are a major danger because the heavy bird flies at similar heights and has poor forward vision. The Supreme Court has therefore supported undergrounding in critical habitats.
- Habitat transformation: Rajasthan’s natural grasslands have been converted into irrigated farms, roads and other infrastructure, reducing suitable habitat and increasing human disturbance.
- Landscape approach: Conservation should move beyond protecting individual species through isolated reserves and focus on entire ecosystems, allowing wildlife and human communities to coexist across larger landscapes.
Great Indian Bustard Conservation
- Two male Great Indian Bustards (GIBs) were recently released into the wild at Desert National Park, Jaisalmer.
- The conservation programme now has 97 birds, with another nine awaiting release.
- Of these, 57 are captive-bred and have produced 29 chicks in the current year and 24 in the previous year.
- This is significant for a species with an estimated population of only around 120 birds.
- The GIB has remained critically endangered for decades.
Causes of Population Decline
- The GIB population declined from around 1,260 in 1969 to 600 in 2000 and around 140–175 in Rajasthan during the 2010s.
- Hunting, including royal hunting, historically contributed to its decline.
- Expansion of irrigation and agriculture converted grasslands into intensive farmland.
- Pesticide use, roads and habitat loss further reduced suitable habitats.
- High-tension power lines became a major modern threat because the heavy bird flies at similar heights and has poor forward vision.
Conservation Challenges
- The Supreme Court's 2021 intervention sought undergrounding of certain power lines in priority GIB habitats.
- The approach was subsequently modified to focus on power lines within the bird's critical habitat, partly considering concerns raised by renewable-energy companies.
- Captive breeding and reintroduction can help increase populations but cannot substitute for protection of natural habitats.
- The broader challenge is balancing wildlife conservation, infrastructure development and renewable-energy expansion.
Species-Centric vs Landscape-Centric Conservation
- India's conservation efforts often focus on high-profile flagship species such as tigers, cheetahs, lions and GIBs.
- Other species receive less attention despite significant declines in their populations.
- Conservation measures can create isolated wildlife populations rather than protecting connected ecosystems.
- Animals such as elephants demonstrate how wildlife populations can move beyond protected areas and create human–wildlife conflict.
- Protected areas are important, but they cannot alone address ecological pressures across wider landscapes.
Way Forward
- Landscapes rather than individual species should become the broader unit of conservation planning.
- Conservation should protect grasslands, forests, wetlands and wildlife corridors as interconnected ecosystems.
- Captive breeding should be combined with habitat restoration and threat reduction.
- Infrastructure projects should incorporate wildlife-sensitive planning from the beginning.
- Local communities should be involved in conservation to promote coexistence between livelihoods and wildlife.
- A landscape-based approach can protect not only flagship species but also the wider biodiversity and ecological processes on which they depend.
Conclusion
India needs to shift from species-centric conservation to landscape-based management. Protecting a few animals inside reserves cannot address habitat fragmentation, infrastructure expansion and human-wildlife conflict. Natural grasslands, forests, wetlands and corridors must be conserved as connected ecosystems. A landscape approach can combine biodiversity protection, local livelihoods and development needs, creating more sustainable coexistence between people and wildlife.