Once-Reviled Scavenger Bird Now the Pride of Its Indian Home

Once-Reviled Scavenger Bird Now the Pride of Its Indian Home
A Greater Adjutant Stork, an endangered bird with a total population of 1,200 in the world, sits on a tree at Dadara village, west of Gauhati, India, on this Oct. 3, 2016. AP Photo/Anupam Nath
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GAUHATI, India—The greater adjutant stork used to be an object of revulsion in northeast India. It’s not a pretty bird, with its large, dull-orange bill and gray, black and white plumage. A carnivore and scavenger, it left bits of dead animals in its nests.

People thought it brought bad luck, so they destroyed nests and sometimes poisoned the birds.

The fortunes of the species may turn on local pride.

Local women took it upon themselves early last year to form a conservation movement for the bird in Assam state, one of only three homes the species has left. The women known as the hargila army, for the bird’s name in the Assamese language, sing hymns and weave scarves and other items on handlooms with motifs of the bird to create awareness about the need to protect the species.

Students of Sankardev Sishu Niketan mould clay in the shape of a Greater Adjutant Stork, an endangered bird with a total population of 1,200 in the world, in school at Dadara village, west of Gauhati, India, on Feb. 6, 2017. (AP Photo/Anupam Nath)
Students of Sankardev Sishu Niketan mould clay in the shape of a Greater Adjutant Stork, an endangered bird with a total population of 1,200 in the world, in school at Dadara village, west of Gauhati, India, on Feb. 6, 2017. AP Photo/Anupam Nath