Male, Otis tarda. Walled Garden, Flamingo Gardens, Olney, 28th August 1977. Not the greatest photo, but an interesting species which was the subject of a reintroduction project at the time. Scanned from a Kodachrome slide.
I think there is a scheme for conducted visits to the current reintroduction project on Salisbury Plain (but it might be difficult to get there on public transport ).
Male, Otis tarda Not the greatest photo, but an interesting species which was the subject of a reintroduction project at the time. Scanned from a Kodachrome slide.
I believe the last bird(s) from that failed project, which involved trying to breed them for release, ended up at Whipsnade. Maybe this one came from there?
They are brilliant. I saw a wild one in Spain many years ago- flew out of a cornfield-HUGE!
Have also visited the Bustard Project birds on Salisbury Plain. You are guaranteed to see a few in the original release pen( normally males) They have started to do much better since they changed over to using Spanish stock which have less migratory instinct. More birds are staying put, last year for the first time a young successfully fledged and joined the population(from a nest in the fox-proof pen I think) and more than one may have fledged successfully this year according to their recent reports.
I believe the last bird(s) from that failed project, which involved trying to breed them for release, ended up at Whipsnade. Maybe this one came from there?
A quote from my Flamingo Gardens guidebook, which I presume was written by Christopher Marler. 'A reintroduction of this bird in its former breeding range on Salisbury Plain is being undertaken and some birds are birds are being kept in the collection under close study to aid this project'.
Unfortunately I can't remember whether I bought this guidebook on my first visit in 1974 or my second in 1977 (when I took this photo): indeed I had quite forgotten that I visited twice, until I looked at the dates of my photos
I think that Mr Marler was quite heavily involved in this first reintroduction project.
The last one from that project definately went to Whipsnade, but I think it only died around 1990. So these Flamingo Gardens ones probably were not connected with Whipsnade .
