Crested Ibis
Nipponia nippon
A white, exotic-looking waterbird with a bright red face and raggedy crest. Adults are washed in gray during the breeding season. Most colorful in flight; underwings are tinged with soft orange. Inhabits paddy fields, wet meadows, and riversides, and breeds in nearby forests. Extremely restricted in range, the bulk of the wild population is restricted to a preserve in Yang’xian in China’s Shaanxi province, though reintroduction programs have been successful in Japan and other parts of China.
Taxonomy
- Scientific name
- Nipponia nippon
- Authority
- (Temminck, 1835)
- Order
- Pelecaniformes
- Family
- Threskiornithidae
- Genus
- Nipponia
Range and habitat
At one time, the crested ibis nested in the Russian Far East, Japan, and Mainland China, and was a non-breeding visitor to the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan. It has now disappeared from most of its former range, and the only natural (non-reintroduced) population occurs in Shaanxi, China.
- Migration
- Resident species
Conservation
The last wild crested ibis in Japan died in October 2003, with the remaining wild population found only in Shaanxi Province of China, until the reintroduction of captive bred birds back into Japan in 2008. They were previously thought to be extinct in China as well, until their rediscovery in 1981.Extensive captive breeding programs have been developed by Japan and China to conserve the species. They are on China's State Protection List. In 2002, there were a total of 130 colonies in China. Northwest Shaanxi province's research center has a history of 26 crested ibis fledglings including artificial and natural incubation. On July 31, 2002, five out of seven crested ibis chicks hatched at an incubation center in northwest Shaanxi province. This was the highest ever recorded number of chicks that hatched. The parents of the chicks were chosen from 60 ibis pairs raised at that research center.<p>In the 1980s, the birds were decimated by overhunting, the use of pesticides, ongoing habitat loss, their already small population size, their limited range, winter starvation and persecution, which together brought the endangered species to the brink of extinction. The crested ibis has been listed in Appendix I of the conservation treaty CITES.<p>The London Zoo had crested ibises from 1872 until 1873. Outside China, only Japan and South Korea currently keep the species.[citation needed]
- Population trend
- rising
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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