A Great Indian Bustard (GIB) chick has been sighted in the wild in Gujarat for the first time in 10 years, thanks to a novel conservation approach.
Union environment minister Bhupender Yadav announced the breakthrough on Saturday, crediting a joint effort between the Union ministry, state forest departments of Rajasthan and Gujarat, and the Wildlife Institute of India.
The chick was hatched from a captive-bred GIB egg transported from Rajasthan to Kutch, Gujarat, in a major trans-state conservation effort.
Yadav said the number of birds in conservation breeding centres in Rajasthan has reached 73, with five new chicks added this season, paving the way for re-wilding in the near future.
The jump-start conservation approach, developed under Project GIB, involves replacing a wild female's infertile egg with a fertile one, allowing the chick to grow entirely in the wild under the care of a wild female.
The approach differs from captive rearing followed by release, as it avoids the stage when eggs face the highest risk of predation.
The Kutch GIB sanctuary is spread over about 2 square km, and the larger bustard habitat in Kutch extends across nearly 2,000 square km of grasslands.
Gujarat forest and environment minister Arjun Modhwadia hailed the conservation effort as a major milestone under the project envisioned by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2011.
