National Geographic UK - 09.2019

EXPLORE | BASIC INSTINCTS

SHY BY NATURE, BUT

SHOWY IN CONQUEST

THE WESTERN TRAGOPAN is a scarce,

shy, and elusive bird. Males are as beau-

tiful to behold as they are rare to spot.

Locals call the species jujurana, king

of birds. Perhaps 3,300 survive in the

wild, in India’s Himachal Pradesh state.

That’s where filmmaker Munmun

Dhalaria spent most of 2017 and

2018, making a documentary on the

jujurana. One day as she hid in a bird

blind, a male drew near, splendid in his

orange-feather ascot and white-spotted

black cloak. After browsing for food, he

hopped onto a boulder and began call-

ing, aiming to woo females and warn off

rivals. Dhalaria, a National Geographic

explorer, watched and filmed the bird

for 35 minutes, one of the longest doc-

umented jujurana sightings in the wild.

Witnessing a mating call is one

thing—an actual mating, quite another.

It’s sometimes glimpsed at the world’s

only captive-breeding program for this

pheasant cousin, in Himachal Pradesh.

The male sidles up to the female. He

deploys his finery: His head sprouts

blue horns, his tail feathers fan, his

rainbow wattle unfurls. At passion’s

peak, he ducks out of view, bursts forth

again, rushes the female, mounts—and

they mate for 10 seconds. Though brief,

it’s effective. During the next six to eight

weeks, she’ll lay three to five eggs and

hatch them. Captive-bred birds form a

reserve as wild populations shrink. The

program has about three dozen birds

and aims to release some into the wild

in 2020. —PATRICIA EDMONDS

PHOTOGRAPH BY MUNMUN DHALARIA

CONSERVATION STATUS

The International Union for

Conservation of Nature labels

the bird vulnerable; it is hunted

for its meat and plumage, and

its habitat is fragmented.

HABITAT/RANGE

Endemic to the western

Himalaya in northern India, the

bird prefers undisturbed for-

ests with lots of undergrowth

where it can feed and hide.