Hope For Animals And Their World Part 7

John has developed an immense respect for these amazing creatures, so ideally suited to their desert environment. "Recently," he told me, "I traveled with Pasha, a one-humped dromedary camel, for three and a half months across the Sahara. As I rode him day after day he became a wonderful companion. In the end he was following me about like a dog, sniffing at my trouser pocket, which held his beloved dried dates."

In 1997 John set up the Wild Camel Protection Foundation (WCPF), a registered charity in the United Kingdom, to raise funds for conservation efforts to protect the Bactrian camels in the wild. The WCPF, working with eminent Chinese scientists, persuaded the Chinese government to establish the 67,500-square-mile Arjin Shan Lop Nur Wild Camel National Nature Reserve-which is bigger than Poland and nearly the size of Texas.

It is wild and desolate desert country where few living things can survive since there is almost no water for most of the year save salty slush that bubbles up from under the ground. At one time, there was some fresh water from the spring snowmelt from the mountains. But the construction of dams and overuse of water for agriculture have more or less eliminated this, except in the mountainous area in the south of the reserve. The wild Bactrian camels have learned to survive by drinking the salty water that the domestic Bactrian would not touch-although the wild camels much prefer to drink sweet water if they can get it.

When I first met John, he was searching for funds to set up five ranger posts for this nature reserve, and I was able to persuade two generous friends, Fred Matser and Robert Schad, to donate money for three of the posts. It was not difficult-both were captivated by my description of the camels, their wild habitat, and the man who risked his life to save them. And both care pa.s.sionately about conservation of the natural world.

John and I b.u.mped into each other again in Beijing, at the China headquarters of the Jane Goodall Inst.i.tute, when he was working to convene a workshop involving delegates from the governments of China and Mongolia. He needed the cooperation of both to ensure the survival of wild camels in the adjoining desert habitats of both countries. Already in 1982, the wild camels of Mongolia were protected in the Great Gobi Reserve A, and they were protected in the newly established nature reserve in China, but there was no communication between the two countries. That workshop led to a historic agreement, signed by both the Chinese and Mongolian governments, to jointly protect the wild camels on both sides of the international border. They also agreed to cooperate in a wild camel data exchange program.

However, despite these successful moves to protect the wild Bactrian camels, there is still grave concern for their future. They have been heavily hunted for their meat and hide over the centuries and are still hunted-for "sport" or because they are perceived as competing with domestic livestock for the precious water and grazing of the desert. Ironically, it was the forty-five-year stretch in which the Gashun Gobi Desert was used as a nuclear test site, when the area was strictly off limits, that provided them with their only refuge. Now, however, a gas pipeline has been built across the once forbidden desert, and it has also become infested by illegal gold miners contaminating the environment with a highly toxic pota.s.sium cyanide. Hybridization with domestic camels poses a further threat to the survival of the wild Bactrians. For all these reasons, John and the WCPF felt that it was important to start a captive wild Bactrian camel breeding program.

In 2003, the Mongolian government not only approved this idea but also generously donated a suitable area for captive breeding-Zakhyn-Us, near the Great Gobi Reserve A, where a freshwater spring provides a year-round supply. A strong fence was erected, a barn for hay storage, and three pens where captive wild camels and newborn calves can find shelter from extreme weather-important since the female gives birth during the coldest months of the year, December to April, and the Mongolian winter can be very severe with temperatures dropping to forty below Fahrenheit.

In the summer months, when the frenzy of mating has subsided and the birth season is over, the captive camels are released from the fenced area so that they can graze as a herd near their natural homeland. During this time, they are constantly supervised by a Mongolian herdsman and his family, who are employed by the WCPF to look after them. Meanwhile the gra.s.s in the penned area is given a chance to recover.

"At the end of the first three years of operation," John wrote, "seven wild Bactrian camels were born to the eleven wild females and the wild bull camel that had been caught by Mongolian herdsmen."

The last time I met John, he had some wonderful news. Recently, after a successful Edge Fellows.h.i.+p training course held at the Zoological Society of London, he had invited two young scientists-one a Chinese and the other a Mongolian-to spend two nights with him in the gher (a Mongolian version of a yurt) that he has built on his land in England. "There, songs were sung and the whiskey flowed, and this helped to soften prejudice and deepen friends.h.i.+p," he said. The two scientists are now firm friends and are in regular e-mail contact over the problems faced by the wild Bactrian camel in their respective countries. "Despite our technological wonders," said John, "it is still, and always will be, human contact that matters."

Before we parted, John gave me one of the only six winter hats that had been woven from hair shed by the Bactrian camels in the breeding program. Soon more of these hats will be available-the herdsman's wife has established a small cottage industry, selling her products through the Wild Camel Protection Foundation Web site. That soft hat is one of my treasured possessions, beside me now as I write, a symbol of hope for the future of both the people and the camels of the Chinese and Mongolian deserts.

Don Lindburg, team leader for giant pandas at the San Diego Zoo, holds Mei Sheng, the second cub to be born at his facility. Mei Sheng moved to China at age four to be part of Wolong's giant panda breeding program. (San Diego Zoo) (San Diego Zoo)

Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca)

I have never seen a panda in the wild. Few people have, even those who have spent years studying them in the field. I have seen several of those loaned out by the Chinese government to various major zoos, including the first pair sent to the Smithsonian National Zoo in Was.h.i.+ngton, DC, in 1972. More recently, I visited those in the Beijing zoo, where somewhat to my surprise the male was lounging up in the fork of a tree. Of course, I now know that they frequently climb, especially the youngsters-I just had not thought of them up among the leaves. Which is hardly surprising as most zoos have only recently begun to supply climbing opportunities for their pandas. have never seen a panda in the wild. Few people have, even those who have spent years studying them in the field. I have seen several of those loaned out by the Chinese government to various major zoos, including the first pair sent to the Smithsonian National Zoo in Was.h.i.+ngton, DC, in 1972. More recently, I visited those in the Beijing zoo, where somewhat to my surprise the male was lounging up in the fork of a tree. Of course, I now know that they frequently climb, especially the youngsters-I just had not thought of them up among the leaves. Which is hardly surprising as most zoos have only recently begun to supply climbing opportunities for their pandas.

The home of the giant panda is in South China, in temperate mixed-broadleaf forests east of the Tibetan plateau. Although there may now be as many as sixteen hundred in the wild, their future is far from certain. One of the problems, other than habitat loss, is their diet. They are bears-yet unlike other bears, they survive only on certain kinds of bamboo. Since bamboo is not nutritious, the giant pandas have to eat very large quant.i.ties of it. So it was especially worrying when, in 1978, there was a ma.s.sive die-off of bamboo in panda habitat. It was unthinkable that the giant panda, a national symbol, should become extinct. So the Chinese government sent scientists into the field to find out what was going on.

First Studies in the Wild Professor Hu Jinchu and his colleagues erected a hut in the Wolong Natural Reserve in the Qionglai Mountains. There they were joined three years later by my old friend Dr. George Schaller, who was to collaborate with the Chinese team in a field study sponsored by the WWF. Things were difficult in China back then; after four and a half years, George felt he could contribute nothing further and left the project. Thinking back to that time, he would later write: "I was filled with creeping despair, as the panda seemed increasingly shadowed by fear of extinction."

Indeed, between 1975 and 1989 half of the habitat of the giant panda in Sichuan Province was lost due to logging and agriculture; the remaining forest was fragmented by roads and other developments. Among other things, this affects the regeneration of the bamboo, since it grows best under a forest canopy. The giant panda population became dispersed in small groups living in isolation. And that, as George wrote, is "a blueprint for extinction." The pandas were also being illegally killed by poachers.

Pan Wens.h.i.+ also began working with giant pandas in the 1970s, starting his own research in the Qinling Mountains. His formal studies had been interrupted by the Cultural Revolution so that he did not start off with the academic credentials of some of the other panda researchers. Nevertheless, his project continued for thirteen years during which he and his all-Chinese team radio-collared and tracked twenty-one pandas, gaining valuable information on all aspects of their behavior.

Devra Kleiman, whose work with the golden lion tamarin is detailed in part 2, has been involved in giant panda conservation work since her first visit to China in 1978, and she got to know Pan Wens.h.i.+ quite well. During one of her visits, in November 1992, Pan promised that-in honor of her fiftieth birthday-she would see her first wild panda. She set off with some of his team for a cave where a female and her cub had been denned up-but when they got there, the pandas were gone. Pan was crestfallen. Suddenly panda calls sounded across the valley, "and not only did I get to see one wild panda, but there were three-one up a tree and two on the ground," said Devra. "It was an incredibly unusual sighting, since researchers almost never saw pandas together outside the spring breeding season, especially not in November. Pan was as thrilled as I was!"

Another biologist who joined the team in the Wolong Natural Reserve in the mid-1990s was Dr. Matthew Durnin, who is now on the board of JGI-China. He told me that he only saw a giant panda in the wild once in his ten years of trudging up and down the steep densely forested slopes looking out for the telltale sign that would indicate where pandas had been-the remains of a bamboo meal and panda p.o.o.p.

From time to time, students joined the team to pick up a few months of field experience. Because the research area was large, the team divided, searching in different areas and sharing information at the end of the day. "One evening," said Matt, "I returned from another panda-less day and realized, at once, that something was up-one of the students, who had only been with the project two months, not only saw a giant panda up close, but photographed it as well!" Apparently he and the Chinese researcher had come upon it when it was asleep, and on waking it had seemed groggy. They had watched for five to six minutes before it woke up fully and hurried away. The only panda Matt saw was glimpsed briefly as it moved along a distant ridge.

During his time at Wolong, Matt got to know many of the staff who were employed locally. "I learned so much from them," he told me. "They got paid very little, but they were so energetic, and seemingly enthusiastic, that you would think they chose the work-though, in fact, there were few opportunities for employment and they probably had little choice."

The caretaker Wee Pung was from a minority group, and had been working at Wolong for almost fifteen years. He seemed really proud of the reserve, and of his role as caretaker. "All that time," said Matt, "this man was keeping watch over the place, living in the woods." And even though he may have taken that work from necessity, one day Wee Pung told Matt that not once since he'd joined the project had he been able to visit his family-he just could not afford the trip. Matt a.s.sumed his family was far away on the other side of the country. In fact, he told me, "it was just a two-hour drive away." And so, of course, Matt drove him there.

Captive Breeding The Chinese have put a lot of effort and money into captive breeding programs, but for years they had little success. Many Western scientists were invited to the Wolong breeding center to work along with the Chinese scientists for short periods-and Devra went for several months in 1982. In those days, the location was difficult to get to. They had to walk for about an hour, uphill, from the main road. And, said Devra, "They had to transport pandas by hand-two workers per panda-up the steep and slippery path, pa.s.sing through two long tunnels that had been blasted out of the mountainside."

One of the problems with the captive breeding at that time, Devra told me, was a lack of understanding of panda behavior that led to inappropriate husbandry. The pandas were caged separately and had no opportunity for socializing. Even during the breeding season, males and females were seldom introduced to each other for fear of aggression. Artificial insemination was the preferred method of inducing pregnancy, and in fact there were few males capable of mating with females naturally. That was partly, Devra believes, because they had no opportunity to climb, and their legs and hindquarters were often not well developed. Sometimes the female had trouble supporting the male during copulation, and he had trouble maintaining his mounting position.

Matt Durnin at work at China's Wolong Nature Reserve, checking a seven-month-old panda. (Matt Durnin) (Matt Durnin) Then, in the mid- to late 1990s, the San Diego and Atlanta zoological societies, responding to requests from China, sent their scientists over to work with Chinese colleagues at Wolong. My good friend Don Lindburg, his postdoctoral student Ron Swaisgood, and Rebecca Snyder from Atlanta did a great deal of successful work there. At the same time Chinese zoos, especially the Wolong and Chengdu zoos, were also working to breed pandas.

Success Finally, starting in 2000, births began to outnumber deaths, and from 2005 there were significant increases in the captive population. "This," said Devra, "was a direct result of a change of att.i.tude toward managing the pandas. All the recent significant increases in the captive population numbers have come about because of better captive conditions and an increase in natural matings." Another factor was an innovative way of helping a mother panda to raise both babies when she has twins, first developed at the Chengdu Zoo Captive Breeding Center. Before this, a mother usually abandoned one of her two babies-which is not surprising, for raising two panda cubs is a lot of work. Like kittens, panda cubs cannot urinate or defecate without stimulation for several weeks-okay with one baby, extremely difficult with two. Now, however, a human caretaker gives the mother a helping hand: The twins are rotated, and while the mother cares for one the human surrogate takes over the other. As a result of all this, in 2008 there was a 95 percent survival rate in infants born at Wolong, compared with 50 percent twenty years before.

First Months of a Giant Panda Cub Recently I had dinner with my old friend Harry Schwammer, director of Zoo Vienna, which is also involved in the giant panda captive breeding program. He told me that they recently experienced their first panda birth. Head keeper Eveline Dungl told me how the mother, Yang Yang, had built a branch-lined den in her outside enclosure, but subsequently moved inside to the specially prepared nesting box. Two mornings later, Eveline heard squeaks "that definitely did not come from Yang Yang."

Yang Yang was an excellent mother, and not until the baby Fu Long was two and a half months old did she leave the den for a few hours at a time to feed outside. "Now, at the age of almost one year," Eveline wrote to me, "Fu Long is already quite self-confident in exploring his surroundings. Even though he still mainly drinks breast milk, he is very interested in bamboo. And he also likes to try leaves or branches of other plants. There is no tree in the enclosure that he has not already climbed, no platform he hasn't napped on."

Harry Schwammer and his staff are engaged in discussions with Chinese scientists about the program to reintroduce giant pandas to the wild. Harry and others believe that it will be important to rear cubs with minimum contact with their human caretakers. But as we shall see, there are many other challenges.

Problems with Reintroduction to the Wild The idea of reintroduction to the wild in China was vetoed in 1991, and again in 1997 and 2000, on the grounds that there was insufficient knowledge, especially with regard to the status of wild pandas and their habitat. It was also felt that there were insufficient funds for such a long-term project. Finally, none of the current regimes of captive breeding could provide suitable candidates. However, in 2006 Xiang Xiang, a young male born at the Wolong breeding center, was released into the Wolong Natural Reserve. In the doc.u.mentary film I saw, he appeared to be doing all right. His keeper showed him how to choose good bamboo, and readings from his radio collar showed that he sometimes made journeys of more than five miles-after which he always returned to the release site. However, this seemingly good start ended in tragedy when he was apparently attacked and wounded by the original panda residents. And although he recovered from those injuries, he was attacked again and died of his wounds.

Tourism and Awareness Today many Chinese schools teach their pupils about giant panda behavior and conservation, especially in Chengdu in Sichuan Province, where local pride in the panda is strong. And indeed, the giant panda has put Chengdu on the tourist map. It's the gateway city for visiting the Wolong Giant Panda Reserve Centre, which gives talks and shows films to visitors, and allows them to play with small panda cubs. What a shock for the group of American tourists that were enjoying this experience when the terrible 2008 earthquake devastated the mountains of Sichuan Province. A New York Times New York Times article found the group full of praise for the "kindness and heroism" of the panda keepers, who helped them reach the road. "Those keepers were risking their lives," said one visitor. "There was nothing safe about any of it." And once all the visitors were secure, the keepers hurried back and rescued all thirteen baby pandas, carrying them tucked under their arms as they negotiated the dangerous rock-strewn route. During the quake, most of the enclosures were destroyed; one panda was killed, two were injured, and six escaped (four of which were later captured). article found the group full of praise for the "kindness and heroism" of the panda keepers, who helped them reach the road. "Those keepers were risking their lives," said one visitor. "There was nothing safe about any of it." And once all the visitors were secure, the keepers hurried back and rescued all thirteen baby pandas, carrying them tucked under their arms as they negotiated the dangerous rock-strewn route. During the quake, most of the enclosures were destroyed; one panda was killed, two were injured, and six escaped (four of which were later captured).

Of course there was immediate concern and anguish for the thousands of people who were affected, particularly the children who perished in the cheaply constructed schools. (All ten schools with JGI Roots & Shoots groups were affected. Most of the teachers and students lost their homes, and many lost family members. Their school buildings are mostly either collapsed or unusable. One young boy was killed.) There was also national and international concern for the wild pandas, most of whom are living in the forty-four nature reserves in the Sichuan mountains. Dr. Lu Zhi, a leading panda expert and China country director for Conservation International, said researchers were trying to find out how the wild pandas had been affected, even as they were helping with the human tragedy.

"The Panda's Day Is Now"

During the 1990s, there was a change in China's conservation policy when, as a result of ma.s.sive flooding in the Yangtze River Basin, the government imposed a ban on commercial logging and launched a vast reforestation effort on the steep hillsides-where clear-cutting had removed the cover necessary for protection of the watersheds. Luckily for the giant panda, much of that area fell within its range. For the Chinese, the giant panda is a national treasure, and suddenly it seemed possible to set aside new reserves for them. Most recently, in 2006, the government expressed even stronger support for the protection of the panda's habitat when the provincial governments of Sichuan and Gansu agreed to expand and connect scattered nature reserves in the Minshan mountain range, home to about half of the approximately 1,590 wild giant pandas believed to live there.

Over the years, conferences to discuss panda conservation have been held in Berlin (1984), Tokyo (1986), Hangzhou, China (1988), and Was.h.i.+ngton, DC (1991). In 2000, the San Diego Zoological Society brought together scientists from China, Europe, and North America to discuss current understanding of the giant panda. Known as Panda 2000, this conference created new collaborations and new friends.h.i.+ps and provided a great deal of new information, which is presented in a major volume, Giant Panda: Biology and Conservation Giant Panda: Biology and Conservation. In his foreword, Don Lindburg wrote: "Perhaps the clearest consensus drawn from this event was that the panda's day is now the panda's day is now."

And George Schaller, so pessimistic when he left China in the 1980s, wrote in his introduction to the book: "The prospects for saving the giant panda are today unequaled."

THE BIRTH OF A PANDA: A SYMBOL OF NEW COOPERATION THE BIRTH OF A PANDA: A SYMBOL OF NEW COOPERATIONA few months ago, I met up with my friend Donald Lindburg in California to discuss his years of involvement with the panda breeding programs in Wolong and San Diego. He told me of the birth he had witnessed, and I asked him to send me an account. It was in San Diego in 1999, the first birth since those at the National Zoological Park in the late 1980s. Bai Yun's pregnancy had been going well. "A veterinarian had recently confirmed the presence of a fetus in Bai Yun's womb via ultrasound," wrote Don, "and her hormone profile led to predictions of a birth within days. Now, the twenty-four-hour watch has begun, and as a video monitor portrays mother in her birth den, the staff waits in hushed silence. There was plenty of evidence to indicate that at this crucial moment in time, something could go wrong, very wrong, giving [rise] to mixed emotions of hope and anxiety. Bai Yun's pregnancy had been going well. "A veterinarian had recently confirmed the presence of a fetus in Bai Yun's womb via ultrasound," wrote Don, "and her hormone profile led to predictions of a birth within days. Now, the twenty-four-hour watch has begun, and as a video monitor portrays mother in her birth den, the staff waits in hushed silence. There was plenty of evidence to indicate that at this crucial moment in time, something could go wrong, very wrong, giving [rise] to mixed emotions of hope and anxiety. "Early in the day, the first signs of labor were evident. As the pace of Bai Yun's straining increased, suddenly there was a scratchy-sounding wail, a sound never before heard by the eager watchers. Immediately, two staff members who were on rotation from the Wolong Centre in China-and who had witnessed previous births-gave the thumbs-up sign. "Early in the day, the first signs of labor were evident. As the pace of Bai Yun's straining increased, suddenly there was a scratchy-sounding wail, a sound never before heard by the eager watchers. Immediately, two staff members who were on rotation from the Wolong Centre in China-and who had witnessed previous births-gave the thumbs-up sign. "All eyes were glued to the video screen when first-time mother Bai Yun bent over and retrieved her seconds-old cub from the floor of the den. She placed it on her expansive ventrum and began to lick it vigorously. Soon, there was a new kind of sound from the cub-a sound we would later call a contentment vocalization-as it dozed off for its first post-partum nap. "All eyes were glued to the video screen when first-time mother Bai Yun bent over and retrieved her seconds-old cub from the floor of the den. She placed it on her expansive ventrum and began to lick it vigorously. Soon, there was a new kind of sound from the cub-a sound we would later call a contentment vocalization-as it dozed off for its first post-partum nap. "The air was electric with excitement. Everyone in the room wanted to shout and clap, but showed great restraint out of fear that the mother in the nearby den might be disturbed. In the days immediately following, "The air was electric with excitement. Everyone in the room wanted to shout and clap, but showed great restraint out of fear that the mother in the nearby den might be disturbed. In the days immediately following, Good Morning America Good Morning America and the and the Today Today show, as well as local media, would check in for the latest word on this rare event. By diplomatic message, sent secretly from China to its Consulate in Los Angeles, at one hundred days of age this new baby would be named Hua Mei, meaning 'ChinaUSA.' show, as well as local media, would check in for the latest word on this rare event. By diplomatic message, sent secretly from China to its Consulate in Los Angeles, at one hundred days of age this new baby would be named Hua Mei, meaning 'ChinaUSA.' "The symbolism was clear. A single birth will not save the species-but now a new direction in its conservation had been noted." "The symbolism was clear. A single birth will not save the species-but now a new direction in its conservation had been noted."

The pygmy hog population was once down to only a few survivors dwelling in Manas National Park in India. Many dedicated individuals helped to restore this unique and highly intelligent animal through captive breeding. (Goutam Narayan) (Goutam Narayan)

Pygmy Hog (Porcula salvania)

I've always loved the pig family. The first animal I "habituated" was a saddleback named (by me) Grunter. He was in a field with about ten others. I took him my apple core after lunch every day during a summer holiday and eventually he let me scratch his back. What a triumph!

One of my treasured memories from my years in Gombe was the time when a sounder of bushpigs came upon me as I sat very still in the forest. They could not make me out, stared and sniffed the air, came closer-until I was surrounded. One gave a snorting alarm call and they ran off a few yards, but returned to stare in silence. Finally they moved on, rustling through the leaves eating fallen mbula fruits. I've spent time, also, watching another member of the porcine family: warthogs on the Serengeti plains, grazing on their bent knees, running with tails straight up, competing with each other for the best dens in which to sleep for the night. And I've glimpsed wild boar while driving at night in Germany, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

When I first saw pygmy hogs-a pair in Zoo Zurich-I could scarcely believe my eyes. A pig, measuring at the most one foot in height, and weighing a maximum of twenty pounds! I was sure I was looking at two juveniles-yet they were perfect little adults, dark brown with coa.r.s.e hair, short stubby legs, and a minute tail. There was a slight crest on the forehead and nape of neck, and a tapering snout. I could just see the canines peeking from the mouth of the male.

The man who first described these diminutive beings in 1847, B. H. (Brian Houghton) Hodgson, must have been very amazed. He reckoned they were a different species, and although other scientists later declared the pygmy hog to be a relative of the wild boar, Hodgson was eventually proved right. Recent genetic investigations indicate that pygmy hogs belong to a unique genus, with no close relatives.

They live in tall dense gra.s.sland where they eat an omnivorous diet of roots, tubers, various invertebrates, eggs, and so on, feeding during the day unless it is very hot. They make quite elaborate nests, often digging a trough with snout and hooves, piling up soil around the edges, lining it with gra.s.s they bend down on each side, and bringing more in their mouths to make a roof. A couple of females and their young may share one nest, while the adult males, who are usually solitary, make their own. Their main predators are the python and dhole (also known as the Asiatic wild dog). And, of course, humans. (For those who like trivia, let me reveal that the pygmy hog is sole host to the pygmy hog sucking louse [Haematopinus oliveri], [Haematopinus oliveri], a louse that is cla.s.sified as critically endangered and named after William Oliver, the chairperson of the IUCN Pigs, Peccaries and Hippos Specialist Group.) a louse that is cla.s.sified as critically endangered and named after William Oliver, the chairperson of the IUCN Pigs, Peccaries and Hippos Specialist Group.) I had no idea, when I saw that pair in Zurich, that pygmy hogs were so endangered. At one time they ranged from Bhutan to Northern India and Nepal. But their numbers have been declining in the wild throughout the past century due to a combination of factors: expansion of human population in the Brahmaputra flood plain region, overgrazing, commercial forestry and flood control programs, taking of gra.s.s for thatching, and, especially, burning. As a result, by the late 1950s it was believed that pygmy hogs had become extinct, and they were so listed in 1961.

Ten years later J. Tessier-Yandell, a tea planter from a.s.sam, visited Gerald Durrell at his zoo in Jersey, England, and asked if there was any special animal in a.s.sam that he was interested in. Laughing, Durrell said, "Yes, get me a pygmy hog." And he did! He found four that were being sold in a tea garden market! They had been captured hiding in a plantation when a small forest patch nearby was burned. It was hoped they would breed, but there were no professionals there to advise and nothing came of it, although several more wild hogs were acquired. Clearly the pygmy hog was not extinct and Durrell, delighted, made plans for a captive breeding program and acquired funding for field research.

William Oliver, at that time scientific officer for the Gerald Durrell Jersey Zoo, organized extensive field surveys in the mid-1970s, and concluded that the only remaining small groups of the pygmy hog were in a.s.sam, in the plains to the south of the Himalayas. There were no more than a thousand individuals, and habitat destruction was continuing.

It was in 1977 that the two pygmy hogs that I met were sent to the zoo in Zurich. At first all went well: The sow farrowed and delivered healthy piglets. But then she died in an "accident." The piglets remained healthy, but the only female among them was, unfortunately, left with her father and brothers. She was only one year old when she became pregnant (far too young) and she died in childbirth. That hope for captive breeding was thus ended. The only other pygmy hogs sent to Europe had gone to London Zoo in 1898 where both members of the pair had died without raising young.

In 1996, with a grant from the EU, the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust (then the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust) got permission to start a captive breeding program in Guwahati (the capital of a.s.sam), and six pygmy hogs were captured from the last surviving population of the species in Manas National Park.

Early in 2008, on the advice of Gerald Durrell's wife, Lee, I called Goutam Narayan, who heads up the program. The voice that traveled to me from India was warm, and he was generous with his time. He explained that, with help from Parag Deka, the excellent veterinarian on staff who has been with them from the start, the breeding program was going well. "We followed established breeding guidelines-and common sense," he said. Usually four or five young are born once a year. They weigh barely five or six ounces at birth, grayish pink at first, then develop faint yellow stripes by the second week. They live up to eight years in the wild but can reach ten years in captivity.

I asked Goutam if he could share any stories from his long years with the project. He told me about a local forest guard in Manas who had rescued a young hog that he had found, half frozen and almost dead, floating down a river on a cold day in October 2002. Veterinarian Parag Deka rushed to Manas and tried his best to revive the hoglet. As its condition deteriorated, it was brought to the breeding center in Guwahati where, against all odds, the little male pig miraculously recovered. He has proved a valuable addition to the breeding program, bringing new genes from the wild, and he has sired several litters during the last six years.

"From the six original individuals," Goutam told me, "we now have about eighty individuals, divided between two centers." He said that the hogs were ready for release into the wild, "but the problem is the continuing exploitation of the environment." I could hear the frustration in his voice. The pygmy hog, he explained, is "a good indicator species"-very sensitive to disturbances in composition of the herbs and other plants in the gra.s.s. And then he went on to emphasize that "they must must have gra.s.s for their nests." They hide in their nests and get protection from the heat and cold. "They must have gra.s.s all the year round," he reported, "all of them." have gra.s.s for their nests." They hide in their nests and get protection from the heat and cold. "They must have gra.s.s all the year round," he reported, "all of them."

Meanwhile the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, alongside the Pygmy Hog Conservation Program, had been working under the guidance of William Oliver and in partners.h.i.+p with the a.s.sam Forest Department, to draw up plans for the long-term management of the species, and to find a suitable site for release. And in the spring of 2008, just four months after I spoke with Goutam, three groups of pygmy hogs, sixteen individuals in all (seven males and nine females), were taken to a facility near Nameri National Park with the goal of creating a second population of the species in the wild. There, with minimal human contact, they lived for five months in pre-release enclosures designed to replicate natural gra.s.sland habitat, getting ready for life in the wild.

At last the day came when they were moved to their final destination, the Sonai Rupai Wildlife Sanctuary, 110 miles northeast of Guwahati. After two weeks in prepared enclosures the doors were opened and they were free to leave. Their movements have been followed by direct observation at bait stations and examination of droppings and nests. Goutam told me in a recent e-mail that most of them are doing well and one of the females has even farrowed in the wild.

A major education outreach program has been initiated in the villages in the area, as it is certain that, without the cooperation of the local people, these little pigs will have no chance of surviving in the wild. At the time of writing, two other potential release sites have been found in a.s.sam, in the Nameri and Orang National Parks. On one of my trips to India I am determined to accept Goutam's invitation to go and meet these enchanting little pygmy hogs and the dedicated people who are working so hard to save them.

Northern Bald Ibis or Waldrapp (Geronticus eremita)

In February 2008, I met Rubio, one of thirty-two northern bald ibis or "waldrapp" that live at the Konrad Lorenz Inst.i.tute in Grunau, Austria. These birds are about twenty-eight inches in length with the long curved bill that characterizes all ibis. They have a distinctive fringe of plumage around the nape of their necks, but their heads are bare with no facial or crown feathers except during the juvenile stage. I had hoped to sit on the gra.s.s while they flew freely around us, as they normally do, but unfortunately all were temporarily confined because the rate of predation had been unusually high.

I went into the huge flight aviary with one of the keepers and Dr. Fritz Johannes, who is in charge of the project. Seen close up, they were beautiful, for we were lucky with the weather: The cold winter sun brought out the glorious iridescent sheen on their almost black plumage, and shone on their long pink bills and pink legs. The juveniles, whose feathers are bronze, had not yet lost their feathered caps.

At first the birds preferred to take mealworms from their keeper and from Fritz, but then Rubio decided I was okay, too, and transferred from Fritz's shoulder to mine. Having consumed an inordinate number of mealworms, he began the serious business of grooming me. What really amazed me was how warm his beak felt, and how delicately and gently he used it as he preened my hair. He also made attempts to probe into my ears and nostrils-I must admit I was not too thrilled about that!

Eventually he was persuaded to return to his keeper-but not before he marked me with white liquid down the back of my jacket. This, of course, is a sign of good luck, so I tried to feel grateful!

I had the huge good fortune of visiting Rubio, one of the hand-reared northern bald ibis in Austria, who are being taught to migrate south for the winter by following ultralights. (Markus Unsold) (Markus Unsold) I was there, with the team from JGI-Austria, to learn about the attempt to teach the waldrapp to migrate from Austria to the south of Italy. In the flight aviary next to Rubio's were the birds that would take part in the spring migration over the Alps.

Extinction in Europe This ibis once ranged in arid mountainous regions from Southern Europe to northwestern Africa and the Middle East. Today, however, it is an extremely rare species, extinct throughout nearly all of its range as a result of pesticide use, habitat loss, and hunting for its tasty flesh. The last waldrapp disappeared from Europe in the seventeenth century. In the 1980s, after all the individuals from the last remaining wild colony in Turkey had been captured for captive breeding, it was thought that the species was extinct in the Middle East.

Between 1950 and the end of the 1980s, the last migratory migratory colonies in the Moroccan mountains vanished. Fortunately, however, birds from that colony had been captured during the 1960s for exhibition in European zoos, and they became the founder individuals for an international zoo breeding program. I saw descendants of those original captives in Innsbruck, where they have been bred for forty years. colonies in the Moroccan mountains vanished. Fortunately, however, birds from that colony had been captured during the 1960s for exhibition in European zoos, and they became the founder individuals for an international zoo breeding program. I saw descendants of those original captives in Innsbruck, where they have been bred for forty years.

By 2000, it was believed that only one colony of about eighty-five breeding pairs of (nonmigratory) bald ibis remained in the wild, in the Souss Ma.s.sa National Park in Morocco. But then, to ornithologists' surprise and delight, a tiny group was located in the Syrian desert. There were only seven birds, but there were three nests, and they were raising young-seven fledged in 2003.

A Human-Led Migration The (usually) free-flying breeding colony that I visited in Austria was established in 1997. Waldrapp can survive well in the Austrian Alps during the summer, feeding on insects and other invertebrates, but they cannot endure the winter months in the wild. To create a self-sustaining population, then, it would be necessary that they learn to migrate-as in the past-to warmer climes. And so a feasibility study (based on the pioneering work with Canada geese and whooping cranes described in the last section) was planned to find out whether the bald ibis could also learn to follow ultralight planes-or trikes, as they're called-on a migration route over the Alps to Tuscany in Italy.

Unlike the whooping cranes-which, as we have seen, are raised by caretakers wearing strange white gowns to prevent them from imprinting on humans, these ibis are hand-reared and bonded closely with their caretakers. They are exposed to the sound of the trikes, and the foster parent-Fritz's wife, Angelika-wears the helmet she will don when flying the plane.

During training, the birds initially flew too far away from the trike, despite Angelika's constant calling. But their performance gradually improved, and the first successful migration started out on August 17, 2004, with nine waldrapp following two trikes. Just over two months later, on September 22, the trikes arrived, along with seven of the waldrapp, at the chosen wintering ground, Laguna di Orbetello, a WWF nature reserve in southern Tuscany. (The other two waldrapp failed to make the journey on their own and were brought along in boxes.) The following year, using a different trike (with old-fas.h.i.+oned wings and more powerful engine), the same route was followed and, with fewer stopovers, took only twenty-two days, from August 18 to September 8. Because this trike could fly at a lower speed, the birds were able to follow more closely so that the whole operation went more smoothly.

During the winter of 20042005, following their arrival in Tuscany, the young birds stayed close to the night roost, seldom venturing much more than half a mile. However, when summer came they began to go on longer flights-up to twelve miles-before returning. And some were seen along the migration route, heading for Austria. After some weeks they returned to Tuscany, but it seemed that the instinct to migrate was still present, and Johannes, Angelika, and the rest of the team were much encouraged.

In spring 2006, all the birds who had followed trikes from Austria to Tuscany in 2004 went on long flights while those from a second successful migration in 2005 remained in the wintering area. Thus it seems that as they get older, they are more likely to leave for the breeding grounds in Austria at the time of the spring migration, and that this is genetically programmed.

That 2006 spring was an exciting time for Fritz, Angelika, and the rest of the team. They received a number of reports of sightings, mainly from bird-watchers and hunters, of individual waldrapp that had gone on these long flights-some as far as three hundred miles. Most of them had retraced the route they had been shown by humans. A few were way off course. In some cases, this may have been because, during their human-led journey, they had been carried part of the way in their boxes (the few that were not following the plane and had to be collected); thus their "memory" of the journey was incomplete.

Finally, in spring 2007-success! Four of the waldrapp who had been led south from Grunau in 2004 had become s.e.xually mature, and to everyone's delight they flew to Austria. These were the female Aurelia and the males Speedy, Bobby, and Medea. They all returned to Grunau safely-"the first complete migration circle of the birds independent of humans," Fritz told me proudly. Places chosen for stopovers were not necessarily the same as those where they'd stopped during the human-led migration, but seemed determined by the type of habitat. Once back, Aurelia bonded with Speedy: They bred and raised three offspring.

The 2007 autumn migration to the wintering grounds in Tuscany started with some confusion, as the seventeen migratory birds got mixed up with the almost forty free-flying birds at Austria's Konrad Lorenz Inst.i.tute. There they lost their motivation to migrate, preferring to stay with the others instead of heading south. It was finally decided to catch the confused birds and release them about thirty-five miles southward. One adult and one of Aurelia's juveniles evaded capture and stayed in Grunau, but four adults, including Aurelia and Speedy with their remaining two offspring, headed south as hoped.

Some of the birds were fitted with a GPS data logger. This stores the position of the bird every five minutes and can be downloaded, once the bird is in range, so that researchers can reconstruct the flight path in detail. The data showed that they had exactly followed the route along which they had been led in 2004. On September 15, Medea, Bobby, and Aurelia with her offspring-but not Speedy-were seen in Osoppo, northern Italy. Five days later-one day after the parallel human-led migration ended up at Laguna di Orbetello-Aurelia (without her offspring) and Medea also arrived in Tuscany. Bobby arrived two weeks later, but the two juveniles have not been seen since.

And what of Speedy? His story is fascinating. Even during the first migration, he flew separately from the others. In spring 2007, he started alone, flying to northern Italy, then on to Slovenia and from there to Austria. Not stopping, he continued on to Styria, near Leoben, then farther northeast until he was close to Vienna. There he turned back to Styria, where-miraculously-he met up with Aurelia and Medea. He and Aurelia then flew together to Grunau.

Then in the autumn, when the group set off to fly back to Tuscany, Speedy once again separated from the group. This time he had been selected to carry a satellite transmitter instead of GPS. This technology only stores some positions every third day, but the advantage is that the researchers get these positions in real time.

Flight formation of the ibis in northern Italy, as seen from an ultralight. (Markus Unsold) (Markus Unsold) All seventeen waldrapp at the start of the 2007 autumn migration. (Markus Unsold) (Markus Unsold) Unfortunately, the device did not work-only transmitting one position on September 18. But this was a very interesting data point, because it was exactly on the flight route-which had been reconstructed from Speedy's spring GPS data-that he had followed in the spring. In other words, he was retracing his own unique flight path back to Tuscany. "We got no further satellite positions and also no sight report," said Johannes. Speedy seems to have disappeared. "Nevertheless," he told me, "the migration of these adult birds was a great success for our project. Aurelia, Medea, and Bobby are the first free-living, independent, migratory northern bald ibis in Europe after about four hundred years! That's a great motivation for us."

One Step Closer to Success As I sit writing this chapter in Bournemouth, in August 2008, I receive an e-mail from Johannes in Slovenia. He tells me they are trying a new route, as a result of the problems of the previous year. Now they are leading the young ibis around around the Alps instead of crossing them-and "it is fantastic till now," he writes. The birds have performed well, flying more than sixty miles per day, much farther than in previous years. the Alps instead of crossing them-and "it is fantastic till now," he writes. The birds have performed well, flying more than sixty miles per day, much farther than in previous years.

And there is also news of the six older s.e.xually mature birds that had learned to follow the trikes. In April, they migrated northward from Italy to Austria. As during the previous year, they ended up in Styria, about fifty miles from their breeding place. All six were then taken to a small village in northern Italy close to the original migration route, where a suitable aviary had been prepared. One pair has bred and successfully raised two birds. The aviary was opened in July. So far the birds have remained close by, but Johannes expects that all eight "will start the migration within the next ten days." If the group reaches Tuscany-"and there is a good and realistic chance of that," says Johannes-"then we could definitely show that human-led migration is a suitable methodological tool for the introduction of independent, migratory groups of northern bald ibis." That will be a great success for the team.

Johannes ends by telling me of the plan to start a new project in 2009 in the Moroccan Atlas region, one of the most important breeding areas for northern bald ibis until the 1980s. The first step will be to explore the food availability in a region in the northern Atlas with some hand-raised ibis.

I think of him, there with his wife and the rest of the team, getting ready for the next flight on the way to Tuscany. And if I close my eyes, I can imagine myself back in the aviary in Austria, sitting with Johannes and Rubio. There I fell in love with these endearing birds, so totally different from whooping cranes. I can almost feel the gentle touch of Rubio's warm pink beak as he groomed me. When it had been time to leave, I had given him the last of the mealworms and, reluctantly, left the colony-to continue with my own, never-ending migration around the planet.

Rod Sayler and Lisa s.h.i.+pley are working tirelessly to ensure the pygmy rabbit's survival. Shown here at the endangered species breeding facility at Was.h.i.+ngton State University, Pullman. (Sh.e.l.ly Hanks) (Sh.e.l.ly Hanks)

Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbit (Brachylagus idahoensis)

In 2007, my tour took me to Was.h.i.+ngton State University (WSU) in Pullman for a lecture. It was there that I heard about the Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit, and the efforts being made to save it from extinction. Once you have seen one, you fall in love-a perfect little rabbit, the smallest in North America. An adult fit easily onto the palm of my hand. Childhood images of Peter Rabbit and his siblings, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cottontail, thronged my mind. I was hooked!

The Columbia Basin population has been isolated from other pygmy rabbits for thousands of years, and is genetically differentiated from those found in Idaho, Oregon, Montana, Nevada, and California. They are specialist feeders, able to live on sagebrush in arid western US rangelands. They need tall, dense sagebrush plants for protection as well as food, and soils that are deep enough for the construction of a burrow system. They are one of only two North American rabbits that actually dig their own burrows.

Starting in the early 1990s, numbers of pygmy rabbits in Was.h.i.+ngton State declined following loss of habitat and fragmentation of the remaining sagebrush ecosystems as ever more land was taken over by farms, ranches, and urban development. In 1999, the Was.h.i.+ngton Department of Fish and Wildlife asked Dr. Rod Sayler and his colleague, Dr. Lisa s.h.i.+pley, if they would help them conduct studies on the declining populations. At the time, Rod and Lisa were working on a.s.sessing the influence of cattle grazing in sagebrush habitats known to be important to pygmy rabbits. These studies had barely started when it was discovered that the largest remaining pygmy rabbit population had just suffered a major crash-possibly due to disease. Probably fewer than thirty individuals remained. USFWS gave these rabbits a temporary emergency endangered listing in 2001 with a final ruling to cement the listing in March 2003. At this time, it was decided to start a captive breeding program with the goal of subsequently releasing them back into the wild.

Sixteen rabbits were captured and sent to three facilities for captive breeding. If any were left in the wild, they soon vanished. Oregon Zoo had already started breeding the non-endangered Idaho pygmy rabbits in order to experiment on the best procedures before trying with the precious remnants of the Columbia Basin population. Rod and Lisa, heading the captive breeding program at Was.h.i.+ngton State University, found that it was necessary to house the rabbits alone, except for mating, because of high levels of aggression. Much was learned from observing the rabbits at night through remote cameras and infrared lights.

It soon became apparent that, unlike Idaho rabbits, the Was.h.i.+ngton individuals had much lower reproductive success-fewer kits per female, lower kit growth rates, and some bone deformities. And all three sites struggled with disease and parasites. Eventually it was concluded that this was partly caused by inbreeding depression resulting from reduced genetic diversity in the small captive population. Every time a genetically important rabbit died, it meant that more diversity was lost and the chances for long-term viability of the tiny remaining population were reduced. Eventually in 2003, the USFWS Recovery Team regretfully came to the conclusion that the only way to improve the reproductive fitness and thus save the last Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits was to allow some of them to mate with Idaho rabbits. This, as had been hoped, considerably boosted the breeding success and the health of the hybrid offspring.

Eventually, after six years, it seemed realistic to make plans to reintroduce some of the Was.h.i.+ngton rabbits into the wild, and once again Idaho rabbits paved the way. Forty-two captive-bred Idahos, equipped with radio collars, were released into the wild in Idaho. They did well, and following the release at least two surviving females gave birth.

The Story of Gra.s.shopper My visit to WSU happened to be just before the first twenty captive-bred Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits were due to be released in eastern Was.h.i.+ngton, a hundred miles from the university, on March 13, 2007. Each was fitted with a little radio collar so that its movements could be monitored. Everyone was excited and hopeful, but everyone knew there was no guarantee of success. I met Len Zeoli, a mature PhD student, who would be studying the rabbits' adaptation to the wild. And I met Gra.s.shopper, one of the male rabbits due to be released. What an utterly adorable little rabbit he was-I was saddened that he would have to carry a radio collar. Tiny though it was, he was tiny, too.

Of course, I was eager to hear how the release went. The report came back from Len that things had gone well, and the rabbits had been "very rabbit-like." But there were unexpected problems-almost half the rabbits dispersed from the release area, traveling off presumably in search of new homes or mates. That did not happen in the test reintroduction in Idaho. In addition, losses to predators (coyotes, raptors) were high.