21 back parrot chicks hatched |19 March 2018

January was an exciting month for the team, with 21 Seychelles black parrot chicks hatching at the Vallée de Mai.

Unfortunately, with the increasing number of chicks, the black parrot team also witnessed increased predation by invasive species such as black rats and yellow crazy ants.

Of the 21 chicks known to have hatched so far 11 have either gone missing or been predated.

Although this level of predation is upsetting, it is very encouraging for the team that the nesting sites that are subject to rat control methods appear to be successful at this point, as the parrots in these nests are growing fast and soon enough will be able to fledge.

The team were able to ring five chicks older than 25 days by the end of the month and they expect to ring another seven in the near future. Despite the predation these relatively high numbers are the sign of a good breeding season.

The team hopes that all the ringed chicks will successfully fledge by the end of February and that they will be able to keep an eye on them later, using the colourful rings on their legs to identify them.

In other black parrot news, an exciting outcome of the yearly research meeting between the Vallée de Mai research team, and Vallée de Mai and SIF management was to begin planning an extensive census of the black parrot population on Praslin and Curieuse.

The census is planned to take place in the next few months. The last such survey was carried out about seven years ago; therefore new data on population size is necessary in order to better protect this unique species.

SIF