This is a critically endangered yellow-crested cockatoo.
The bird has been nearly wiped out from its original habitat
in Southeast Asia.
Globally, there are only 2,000 left in the wild.
But about 10% of them have found an unlikely
sanctuary in Hong Kong.
Although they’re not from China,
these beautiful, boisterous birds
have found a new home in the concrete jungle.
Astrid Andersson is a Ph.D. student who grew up in Hong Kong
and is now studying the city’s wild cockatoos.
The cockatoo has historically been a popular pet
because of its intelligence and ability to perform tricks.
YouTube is full of videos of dancing cockatoos.
Even the voice of wildlife documentaries,
David Attenborough, once kept a pet cockatoo.
Sir David’s cockatoo was likely a sulphur-crested cockatoo,
not a yellow-crested one.
They look very similar to our endangered
yellow-crested cockatoo,
but the sulphur-crested cockatoo is larger, not threatened,
and commonly seen in Australia and New Guinea.
The yellow-crested cockatoos from Southeast Asian countries
like Indonesia are less fortunate.
They are now critically endangered because of a
double whammy of habitat loss and rampant pet trade.
An international trade ban against wild-caught
yellow-crested cockatoos came into force in 2002.
But in spite of the potential five-year jail term in Indonesia,
some smugglers still try to sneak these precious birds out.
We asked Ande Kefi, a ranger in Indonesia,
to tell us more about who the cockatoo poachers are.
The poachers don’t earn much, but when the birds change hands,
that’s when the price goes up.
Cockatoos can fetch quite a lot of money
at bird markets like this one in Hong Kong.
During a recent visit, we saw a few cockatoos,
including a smaller species that
looks very similar to the endangered one.
The seller said the bird was a sulphur-crested cockatoo,
not the endangered one,
but he was ambiguous about where the bird came from.
In Hong Kong, it is still legal to trade endangered cockatoos
that are either bred in captivity or obtained before the trade ban,
but enforcement can be tricky.
Meanwhile, the cockatoos in Hong Kong
have adapted to the urban environment in interesting ways,
according to Astrid,
who has traveled to Indonesia on research trips.
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