New poster launched in fight against parrot trade

india parrot poster All of India’s native wildlife is protected by law but this does not stop traders from taking wildlife from their native habitat. The pet trade is the most highly visible of the buying and selling of wildlife. To help stamp out the trade in parrots for the pet trade enforcement officers and other organisations in India are being given a free poster detailing the 12 native parrot species.

Parrot ID poster issued to India’s public officlas and education departments.

By issuing the new posters to police, forestry officials, environmental officers together with schools and colleges TRAFFIC India and WWF India hope to cut the impacts of the pet trade on endangered and vulnerable bird species in India.

Few know that our favourite and well-known ‘mithu’ is a protected species in India. Their chicks are captured remorselessly from the wild, and many to not make it to the final destination.

Wild parrot trading banned since the early 90′s.

Trading in any native bird species has been banned in India since the early 90′s but there are still some criminals happy to make a fast buck out of taking parrots from the wild. Most of the parrots taken from the wild for the pet trade involves removing chicks from their nests in the forest. Most of the chicks are between 3 and 4 weeks old. Hundreds of these young chicks are taken from their nests each year.

With chicks being traded between December and June the new posters are being released right in the peak of the parrot chick trading period.

Adult birds are also caught and sold year round. The adults are normally caught using nets and bird-lime. Bird-lime is nothing more than a powerful glue that poachers paint onto branches and tree trunks so any bird landing on it gets stuck.

The methods of capture and the way that birds are transported means that there is a very high death rate. For every bird that makes it to the pet shop several would have died during the capture and transport of the birds.

8 of 12 native parrot species found in the pet trade.

Eight of the 12 native species of parrots found in India regularly turn up in the illegal pet trade. These are:

Alexandrine,
Rose-ringed,
Plum-headed,
Red-breasted,
Malabar,
Himalayan Parakeets,
Finsch’s Parakeets,
and Vernal Hanging-parrot.

Abrar Ahmed, ornithologist and a bird trade consultant to TRAFFIC India said, “The Alexandrine Parakeet is one of the most sought after species in the Indian live bird trade and is traded in large volumes throughout the year.

“The chicks are collected from forested areas and transported to bird markets in Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Patna, Lucknow and Kolkata.

“Many specimens are smuggled by Indian dealers via Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh to bird markets in various parts of the world.

“Alarmingly, three species of Indian parrots—Nicobar, Long-tailed & Derby’s Parakeets—are considered by IUCN as Near Threatened with extinction, with illegal trade posing a significant threat.”

MKS Pasha, Co-ordinator of TRAFFIC India said: “Few know that our favourite and well-known ‘mithu’ is a protected species in India. Their chicks are captured remorselessly from the wild, and many to not make it to the final destination.

“The parrot trade is substantial and well organized, but it can be counteracted through concerted enforcement actions at the grassroot level and mass awareness campaigns.

“TRAFFIC India’s new poster is a step in this direction. We hope it will also inspire children and young people too, because they are the ones who will influence future change and can play a significant role in curtailing the demand for our native wildlife.”

It’s hoped that the new poster entitled “Parrots of India in Illegal Trade” will raise awareness of the issues with schools children and students as well as those actively involved with countering wildlife crime.

Update 19th February: I’ve had a couple of emails asking where people can download the poster from to print out. I’ve not been able to find the link on either TRAFFIC or WWF India so you can download it from here. The poster is about 2.3MB large. It is 35 inch by 22 inch in dimensions. I’ve printed it out in A3 size on my printer and the text is too small to read so you really do need to print it out at full size over a number of pages and stick them together if you do not have a large format printer. Download full size parrot poster (right click on the link and save target as…).

External sites:

TRAFFIC .

WWF India.