PAPUA NEW GUINEA (Commonwealth Union)_A rare pigeon species was photographed for the first time in 140 years by a group of scientists and environmentalists on Fergusson Island, a small island off the coast of eastern Papua New Guinea.
“Seeing those initial images of the pheasant-pigeon felt like finding a unicorn after a month of looking,” said John C. Mittermeier, director of the American Bird Conservancy’s lost birds programme and expedition co-leader. “It’s the kind of moment you fantasise about as a conservationist and birdwatcher your entire life.”
The last time this rare bird, distinguished by its huge size and pheasant-like tail, was discovered and described was in 1882.
The expedition team headed out in early September to find the animal in order to rediscover it. They travelled over the island, speaking with various locals and community members to determine the best spots for camera traps to capture the bird. The interviews led them to the slopes of Mt. Kilkerran, where they set up 12 camera traps around the mountain slopes and eight more cameras where hunters remembered sighting the birds earlier.
The discovery was made possible thanks to a tip from a hunter from the Duda Ununa village near Mt. Kilkerran. Augustin Gregory, the hunter, told the crew he saw the bird and heard its sounds in an area with steep peaks and valleys near the settlement. According to Gregory’s accounts, the team set up a camera on a ridge near the Kwama River, and that device got photographs of the bird two days before the team was planned to depart the island.
“I estimated there was less than a one percent possibility of acquiring a snapshot of the black-naped pheasant-pigeon when we collected the camera traps,” said Jordan Boersma, conservation biologist and expedition co-leader. “Then, while I was reading through the images, I was taken aback by this photograph of a bird walking straight past our camera.”
In 2019, an expedition to find the black-naped pheasant-pigeon proved unsuccessful. Scientists, on the other hand, used the information from that trip to help them select areas for setting up cameras for their 2022 mission.
