An expedition team investigating the tropical jungles of northern Madagascar rediscovers the Dusky Tetraka, a little olive-colored and yellow-throated bird that bounces around on the ground and has eluded ornithologists for 24 years. The species was discovered by the expedition team, directed by The Peregrine Fund’s Madagascar Program, in two different isolated locations: one near Andapa in January of this year and one on the Masoala Peninsula in late December 2022. The Dusky Tetraka was last seen in 1999, making it one of the top ten most elusive birds according to the Search for Lost Birds initiative, a partnership between the American Bird Conservancy (ABC), BirdLife International, and Re: wild.
“Now that we’ve found the Dusky Tetraka and better understand the habitat it lives in, we can look for it in other parts of Madagascar, and learn important information about its ecology and biology,” said Lily-Arison Rene de Roland, Madagascar Program Director for The Peregrine Fund, and expedition leader. “There is a lot of biodiversities still to discover in Madagascar.”
Dusky Tetraka can only be found in Madagascar, where Rene de Roland spent several months searching for it
Rene de Roland spent several months looking for the Dusky Tetraka in Madagascar, the only place where it is found. Rene de Roland also discovered the Madagascar Pochard in 2006 in a remote region of northwestern Madagascar and was a student working with The Peregrine Fund when the Madagascar Serpent Eagle and Red Owl were rediscovered. In late December 2022, he and his team went out towards the area around Andapa in pursuit of the tetraka, a bird that resembles a warbler and is unique to Madagascar. To get to the last location the bird had been spotted, the team had to travel for more than 40 hours and climb for half a day up difficult terrain. Since 1999, no ornithologists had visited the location again.
Although though the region is formally protected as a part of the COMATSA Sud protected area, when the crew arrived at the location they discovered that much of the forest had been destroyed and turned into vanilla fields. After five days of hunting, they made the decision to relocate to lower elevations because they had not found any indication of the bird and believed it might not reside there.
Another team from The Peregrine Fund’s Madagascar Program discovered the tetraka on the Masoala Peninsula
Another team from The Peregrine Fund’s Madagascar Program, led by Armand Benjara and Yverlin Pruvot, discovered the tetraka on the Masoala Peninsula where they caught and released a single Dusky Tetraka in a mist net on December 22. This discovery was made while Rene de Roland and his team were looking for the bird close to Andapa. Since he began working as a biologist for The Peregrine Fund, Banjara has been expecting to discover the tetraka.
“Seeing the bird for the first time was truly a surprise,” said Benjara. “Our entire team was extremely happy and excited.”
Eight days into their journey, on January 1, Rene de Roland’s crew caught their first glimpse of a Dusky Tetraka. John C. Mittermeier, Director of the Search for Missing Birds Program at ABC, finally spotted a bird that resembled the Dusky Tetraka jumping around in dense undergrowth nearby the river and took a shot of it. The location was next to a rocky river. They swiftly directed the search to that location after confirming with the rest of the team that it was the Dusky Tetraka.
“If Dusky Tetrakas always prefer areas close to rivers, this might help to explain why the species has been overlooked for so long,” said Mittermeier. “Birding in tropical forests is all about listening for bird calls and so you naturally tend to avoid spending time next to rushing rivers where you can’t hear anything.”
On the last day of the mission, the crew was successful in utilizing a mist net to capture one Dusky Tetraka
On the last day of the mission, January 2, the crew was successful in utilizing a mist net to capture one Dusky Tetraka, study and measure it, and then release it unharmed. The two Dusky Tetrakas they discovered spent much of their time in deep vegetation close to the river, probably searching the moist undergrowth for insects and other food.
Due to the Dusky Tetraka’s striking resemblance to the far more prevalent Spectacled Tetraka, there has been a long history of misidentification. Ornithologists have found it challenging to gather the Dusky Tetraka’s distinctive traits because there are so few confirmed observations of the species. In order to make certain they could correctly identify the DuskyTetraka if they discovered it, the expedition crew read through every historical account of the bird going back almost a century before leaving.
The Dusky Tetraka will be searched for once more between September and October, when most birds in Madagascar breed, according to Rene de Roland, a member of The Peregrine Fund’s Madagascar team. To learn more about the distribution and conservation status of the species, they intend to travel to further locations that correspond to the habitat and elevation where they observed it in December and January. The Dusky Tetraka is probably in danger since the majority of northeastern Madagascar’s lowland rainforest has already been devastated.
The Search for Missing Birds looks for species that have gone at least ten years without a confirmed sighting
The Hunt for Missing Birds looks for species that haven’t been seen in at least ten years. When it started in 2021, it created a list of the top ten most wanted lost birds. Another of the top ten missing species, the Santa Marta Sabrewing, was discovered in Colombia in July 2022 by Yurgen Vega, a biologist working with SELVA, ProCat Colombia, and the World Parrot Trust in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. The Siau Scops-Owl in Indonesia, South Island Kakak in New Zealand, Himalayan Quail in India, Itombwe Nightjar in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cuban Kite in Cuba, Negros Fruit Dove in the Philippines, the Vilcabamba Brushfinch in Peru, and Jerdon’s Courser in India are the eight birds that have yet to be rediscovered.