Prague, Aug 1 (CTK) – A secretary bird hatched at the Prague zoo these days for the first time after 31 years of a continuous breeding of this species, zoo spokeswoman Alena Steffelova has told CTK.
The young bird is strong and healthy, staying in the nest with its parents, she added.
This is a great success of the Prague breeders since this African bird of prey only rarely reproduced in captivity.
“Only seven zoos in the world could boost of a young of the secretary bird in the past 12 months,” Prague zoo director Miroslav Bobek said.
The young secretary bird is ten days old and it fares well, though the parents are not able to feed it yet, Antonin Vaidl, curator of the birds section, said.
“They are trying, but in vain… However, we believe that as the young is growing, they will manage to feed it, or possibly that the young will be skilful enough to feed itself along with them,” he added.
So far, the breeders feed the young bird four times a day.
The secretary bird (Sagittarius serpentarius) came to the Prague zoo in 1952 and its systemic breeding started 34 years later. This year’s young is the first to hatch there in history.
The secretary bird is a very large, mostly terrestrial bird of prey. It characteristic features are long legs, slim body, mainly off-white colour and especially prolonged feathers on the head. If they are ruffled up, they resemble quills behind the ears of a medieval scrivener.
