Narcondam Island located off the coast of India was recently studied by a group of scientists. Natural history photographer Prasenjeet Yadav received an invitation from bird biologist Dr. Rohit Naniwadekar to study the remote island. The focus would be on the endangered species Narcondam Hornbill.
Yadav agreed to go close to the end of 2019 and then needed to obtain permits from the government in order to go onto the island.
Along with four others, Yadav went onto the island for a span of two months. The land was hardly touched by humans and the group had to crawl beyond native plants. There were giant buttress trees growing all around, some reaching over 100 feet.
Upon taking the first look around the island, the scientists noticed a dense population of the Narcondam Hornbills. As a result, the scientists wanted to dedicate their research to calculating the population of the hornbills and find out why their population is so high on the island as compared to other areas.
The scientists spent most of the daylight hours documenting every plant species and animal they would come across in efforts to understand how the island ecosystem worked. Yadav even would spend hours sitting in trees watching the hornbills’ behavior and writing observations. He also did so in hopes of getting close-up photographs of the creatures.
After using various methods to track the population and gather data, the scientists concluded an average of 390 hornbills per square mile. They estimate the total population on Narcondam to be 1,000. The concentration of the birds on the island is the highest out of all hornbill species in one area across the planet.
Narcondam Hornbills have thick beaks allowing them to break into fruit such as figs, their primary source of food. The scientist found many fig trees scattered about the isle, but more surprising the fig trees there are taller than elsewhere. The amount of fig trees contributes to a lasting food supply throughout the entirety of the year for the hornbills. The hornbills in turn deposit the fig seeds through their waste, which helps the fig trees stay replenished.
However, no paradise is without threats. Humans pose the threat of adding infrastructure to the untouched island in an effort to keep it as their territory. China has been looking at the islands in that area trying to take them.
Another threat is climate change. The Narcondam Island ecosystem is a closed system meaning everything heavily relies upon another species. One bad growing season resulting in less figs could destroy the Narcondam Hornbill population, as the figs are their main source of
food. The population of the hornbills would decrease, which would decrease the rest of the biodiversity around the island because of less seeds being carried by the birds.
If nothing is done to help protect the endangered Narcondam Hornbills, then Yadav’s fear of his last time seeing those birds may have been when he left the island. For more information go to: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/travel/narcondam-hornbill-india.html.
