Southern ground hornbill "Manfred" in the bird show "Wings" at Kolmården. In Swedish, Southern ground hornbill is called ”marknäshornsfågel”, thereby is he called ”Manfred”. In this picture he is just entering the bird venue from the forest.
Kolmården has had bird shows since the beginning of the 90s. The old Asian steppe was divided into two by a fence and half of it now holds South American animals and the other half is the bird venue. The birds and the South American animals are under the same department. The venue is really nice with the forest as the background and the birds normally enter the venue from a rock in the forest where a keeper releases them.
Since the beginning and until 2008 the shows had been informative talks with the birds flying around. In 2009 it was premiere for the show “Legends of the Sky” and for the first time it was more like a show, for example with music, than an informative speech. This show was really good. In 2011 it was replaced by “Trollpackans fåglar” (The Sorceress’ Birds) which I didn’t like, it was too much show and not enough focus on the birds. In 2013 the new show “Wings” had premiere and is still showed. It has a medieval-theming and the focus is again on the birds. It is good, but not as good as “Legends of the Sky”. Species that are displayed in the show are normally Harris’ hawk, Southern ground hornbill, eagle owl, military macaw and laggar falcon.
