In Hawaiian tradition, the souls of the dead travel to the afterlife by jumping from a cliffside promontory known as a “jumping place.” P&omar; A swirling sea of time where gods and ancestors dwell. But without someone’s guidance,AumakuaThe spirits of the dead, who sometimes take the form of animals, cannot fly. without them “Aumakua, These lost souls are doomed to eternal wandering and starvation, forever chasing moths and crickets in search of food.
For decades, one of the most important guides of souls has disappeared from Hawaii’s skies. “Aral”, A type of crow found only on this island, it has been extinct in the wild since 2002. There have been multiple attempts to reintroduce captive-born crows. “Aral” The voyage to Hawaii Island ended in failure, mainly because ‘io, or the Hawaiian hawk, “Aral”The last surviving natural enemy.
But now new hopes are spreading their wings. This is a fresh class of 5 young people. “Aral” Released into the wild on the slopes of the Haleakal Mountains. A volcano on Maui ‘io is absent.
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“Conservation doesn’t happen overnight,” said Hannah Bailey, conservation program manager for the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance’s Hawaii Endangered Birds Program. “We’re still learning, and so are the birds.”
of “Aral” is the world’s most endangered crow and one of only two species of crow known to be widely used as tools.
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance
of “Aral”, More like a crow than a crow, this bird is the world’s most endangered crow and one of only two crow species known to be widely used as tools. It is also the most talkative bird in the corvid family, with more than 50 recorded calls, and is called the “bird of the loud voice” in Hawaiian mythology. of “Aral” Omnivorous, their main diet consists of fruits and insects collected from the forest understory, but they also eat flower petals, nectar, mice, and young birds.
For Hawaiians, “Aral” is Aumakua Professor at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, mooleloor traditional knowledge, including folklore and mythology. “”Aumkua They often appear in dreams (or) visions, and they call out to those they protect to warn them of danger, and sometimes to scold them for their misdeeds. ”
“Because of the familial and symbiotic relationship, people did not harm or eat their own food. “Om” Kur But he fed them and helped them when they were in trouble,” she added.
What became clear was that “Aral” They were “destitute” when their population plummeted in the 1970s and 1980s. Avian malaria, invasive predators such as feral cats, and habitat loss due to ranch expansion have reduced the population to just a few dozen individuals. Scientists in Hawaii began removing eggs from nests in the mid-1970s to create genetic arks in captivity.
Currently, more than 100 animals reside in two captive breeding centers operated by the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance. “Aral”–However, Bailey explains that a stable population in captivity is a world apart from the wild. If the animal is several generations removed from living in the natural world, reintroduction can be a tedious process. This is especially true if the threat that brought the population to its knees still exists.
Five “Aral” They were released on Maui, where they were natural enemies. ‘Io, Or the Hawaiian hawk does not exist.
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance
Reintroduction attempts in the 1990s and late 2010s had high mortality rates. Some of the birds appeared to have died from malnutrition, while others were infected with toxoplasmosis and avian pox. For many years, ‘io Killed at least 16 people released “Aral” And it caused conservationists to halt reintroductions. Although these losses were “heartbreaking,” Bailey says, The amount of information we learn about behavior between groups, bonds, and even food and resource usage is invaluable in planning for the future. ”
The five birds released on Maui are between 1 and 18 months old, making them “a particularly suitable age for learning how to cope with new things,” Bailey said. “You could think of them as a group of naughty teenagers at this point.”
Bailey and her team deliberately cluster hatchlings together, creating “classes” of chicks of the same age, “because we want them to form social relationships,” she says. scientists aren’t sure that “Aral” They form large social groups or prefer to be solitary outside of heat, but Bailey said they band together to “mob” and fend off predators, just as their other corvid cousins do. He says he hopes so.
There is a clear power dynamic in a group of two women and three men. “The females are a little bit pushier,” Bailey says. “Even if they’re younger, they’re like, ‘No, we’ve got this.’ This is how you do things.” And they’re almost always right, she says.
From an early age, the birds were fed native Hawaiian food sources such as insects and fruit. A relatively new addition to their course is anti-predator training. Young crows were taught to recognize it. ‘io, Associating barn owls and domestic cats with alarm sounds from adults “Aral”. “If they don’t respond appropriately, they’re less likely to be included in the release population,” Bailey said.
Before being transported by helicopter to the Maui release site, the graduating birds received a traditional blessing from hula master Kaponoai Moritau. “Aral” as “hulu”, or honorable elders. The crows then spent several weeks in an outdoor aviary on the slopes of Maui before being released into a remote forest preserve.
Initially, food is dropped off to the birds to ease the transition to self-sufficiency. This new class is also equipped with a tracking harness, which will allow researchers to track their movements and learn their fate.
What does success look like for this population? Bailey says it doesn’t mean immediately establishing a wild breeding population. “We want to see them take advantage of the landscape,” she says. “We want to see it survive.”
