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 Madagascar and other IslandsThe Biological Wealth of an Impoverished Country: Birds: Page 1 Until recently, the amazing lemurs and other mammals of Madagascar eclipsed its remarkable bird life. Apart from the extinct elephant birds, 120 species of the 204 native birds are unique to the island (Morris and Hawkins 1998). Like tropical birds of other parts of the world, most are dazzlingly beautiful in brilliant hues. Unlike most tropical birds, however, they represent fascinating examples of evolution, including families of birds that exist nowhere else, having evolved from a single ancestor into many forms, some very bizarre. Most ornithologists recognize five bird families as unique to Madagascar, each with extremely distinctive characteristics. Four of these have some or all species that are threatened. The fifth, a family consisting of a single bird, the Cuckoo-Roller (Leptosomus discolor), is secure for the moment (Morris and Hawkins 1998). A few thousand years ago, there may have been far more native bird species that disappeared without a trace as their habitats were destroyed.
Native birds are not thriving, as people and livestock destroy their varied habitats, to which they had adapted over thousands of years. A total of 41 species, all but three of which are endemic, have been listed in the 2000 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, based on the research of BirdLife International published in 2000 in Threatened Birds of the World. The latter book illustrates each threatened Madagascan bird and describes status, population numbers, distribution and other pertinent information. The three non-endemic birds also breed in the neighboring Comoros or Seychelles (BI 2000). Thus, 20 percent of all native birds and 34 percent of endemic birds are threatened, five species listed as Critical, six as Endangered, 16 as Vulnerable, and 14 as Near-Threatened (BI 2000). Moreover, many native birds that were once widespread have become restricted to isolated forest reserves and parks, not yet endangered but far less numerous than in previous times. While the percentage of threatened birds is less than that of endemic mammals, it is significant, especially considering that 27 species are either Critical, Endangered or Vulnerable in the 2000 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Madagascar has more threatened birds that all of the continental United States (excluding Puerto Rico and Hawaii). Its threatened birds total 41 threatened species, five greater than the United States’ 36 (BI 2000). Only 4 percent of the 810 breeding birds native to continental US and Canada combined (Sibley 2000) are threatened. If birds in the United States faced the same degree of threat as Madagascar's birds, at least 162 species would be threatened with extinction.
Fortunately for the future of these unique birds, organizations such as BirdLife International; the Peregrine Fund; Conservation International; the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust; and an ad hoc group, The Working Group on Birds in the Madagascar Region, are researching and working to conserve Madagascar's native birds. Malagasy ornithologists and members of the public are participating in surveys, studies and conservation programs. An inventory of the status and taxonomy of all of Madagascar's birds is in progress (Morris and Hawkins 1998).
In spite of Madagascar’s many unusual birds, interesting to specialists and amateur birdwatchers alike, no bird guide or text illustrating and describing the island's avifauna existed until 1990, when Olivier Langrand's Guide to the Birds of Madagascar was published, providing information on natural history, status, habitats and distribution, as well as color paintings of all native birds. This material supplemented the lengthy descriptions in Threatened Birds of Africa and Related Islands, a 1985 publication of the International Council for Bird Preservation, now called BirdLife International (Collar and Stuart 1985). Madagascar: A Natural History, by Ken Preston-Mafham (1991), included extensive information on many native birds and their habitats. Birds of Madagascar, A Photographic Guide (Morris and Hawkins 1998), published in 1998, updates the latter publications with vivid color photographs illustrating almost all native birds, including many species discovered or rediscovered during the 1990s, such as the two new species, the Cryptic Warbler (Cryptosylvicola randrianasoloi) and the Red-shouldered Vanga (Calicalicus rufocarpalis), and the rediscovery of several birds thought extinct: the Madagascar Serpent Eagle, Madagascar Red Owl (Tyto soumagnei) and Red-tailed or Fanovana Newtonia (Newtonia fanovanae). The 1990s also saw the making of many films about the island's wildlife, including its birds (see Video section).
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