Where water meets sky 

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In a world first, conservationists in Zambia’s Bangweulu Wetlands are using life-like puppets to hand-rear shoebill chicks for reintroduction into the wild, while community members monitor nests to safeguard shoebill populations and help protect one of Africa’s most important wetland ecosystems. Iga Motylska spoke to three women spearheading non-profit African Parks’ Shoebill Management Plan. 

A hunched-over, head-down figure enters the enclosure. Cloaked in a black ghillie suit, with knee-length, black wellingtons, the figure moves at a deliberate pace, with a slight sway mimicking the characteristic gait of a shoebill.

The left hand, concealed in a grey sock, occasionally sweeps the air resembling the bird’s wing movement. Meanwhile, the right arm is encased within a life-like shoebill puppet. It resembles creatures that may feature on children’s TV shows. 

A soundtrack of a shoebill “bill clapping” plays in the background. The series of rapid clicks followed by brief pauses sound like wooden blocks being struck together. With measured movements, the figure steadily moves towards a shoebill chick, which responds immediately by extending its neck and excitedly hiccupping – the way in which it asks for fish. 

“Our three puppets are critically important tools, especially during the first three months of a chick’s life in the captive rearing facility,” says Maggie Hirschauer, an animal behaviourist and Bangweulu Wetland’s Shoebill Programme Manager – a project run by conservation non-profit African Parks. “We want them to think we’re a shoebill to prevent the association of food with the human form,” she explains of their efforts to avoid human interaction and imprinting. 

Alongside her team, Maggie is helping to protect the species across Zambia’s Bangweulu Wetlands through the world’s only shoebill captive rearing and rehabilitation facility. With less than 5 300 mature wild shoebills across the wetlands of central-eastern Africa, from South Sudan to Zambia, the species holds Vulnerable status according to The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Though shoebills are protected under Zambian law with a possible prison sentence of up to seven years, the birds still fall victim to the illegal wildlife trade, hunting, human-wildlife conflict and habitat loss due to seasonal man-made fires and population growth. 

“Bill Diamond [the Emmy Award-winning puppeteer, who’s perhaps best known for his work on The Muppets] was excited to work on a project that uses real-world applications of puppets beyond entertainment and education,” Maggie reveals. 

In Zambia the local name for the Shoebill is means the one who drums on weed. Clemmie Borgstein

Life in the Bangweulu Wetlands

The water mirrors the sky in the Bangweulu Wetlands of north-eastern Zambia. It’s no wonder then that in the iciBemba language, Bangweulu translates to “place where the water meets the sky”. This deep swamp of floating grass and papyrus that’s surrounded by grasslands and miombo woodlands creates a wetland ecosystem of some 9 850 km2 to give it ‘Wetlands of International Importance’ status under the RAMSAR Convention.  

It is home to more than 400 bird species, among them great white pelicans, saddle-billed storks, African spoonbills and Vulnerable wattled cranes, including a small but important population of shoebills – earning it the title ‘Important Bird Area’ from BirdLife International.  

“Historically, people have visited Bangweulu to see wild shoebills. Despite being very shy and secretive birds, last year some guests saw up to five a day,” says Clemmie Borgstein, a conservationist specialised in landscape-level approaches to preservation and the inclusion of communities into protected area management. 

As one of the country’s largest natural fisheries, the wetlands are vital for food security for close to 60 000 people who live within the designated 6 645 km2 Game Management Area (GMA) – a mixed-use buffer zone bordering Lavushi Manda National Park. The continued existence of shoebills is increasingly dependent on the community’s buy-in to protect them and their ecosystem. 

Due to dwindling wildlife numbers, since 2008, the Bangweulu GMA has been co-managed by Zambia’s Department of National Parks and Wildlife (DNPW), six chiefdoms represented by Community Resource Boards (CRBs) and African Parks. The latter established the Shoebill Nest Protection Programme in 2012 and the shoebill captive rearing and rehabilitation facility a decade later. 

“Building trust, communication and [advising on] decision making with all of these stakeholders is a huge challenge. But if it’s done right, it can be the future of conservation in Africa and places where communities are part of the landscape,” she emphasises. 

Clemmie explains how this partnership protects the ecosystem while managing natural resources for long-term sustainability. The communities spend nine months on small islands across the wetland during fishing season and return to their villages to farm cassava and maize during the national, government-mandated fish ban (December to February) to allow fish to spawn. 

Despite being attentive parents, shoebills historically raise one chick to maturity. To avoid obligate siblicide, which naturally occurs when the stronger, older chick kills or outcompetes its weaker, younger sibling for resources, the team either removes the first egg from each nest for incubation, or rescues one of the two chicks as soon as possible after hatching.  

Eggs are incubated and the chicks are hand-reared in the captive rearing facility with the help of the surrogate puppet. Once they have grown sufficient feathers to thermoregulate, they spend time in the outdoor boma on their own 1.75-metre nest constructed of papyrus stems and reeds topped with softer, smaller grasses and plant fibres, overseen by a life-size, printed cut-out of a shoebill. Here, the fledglings learn to fly and catch live catfish from trough-like ponds in each of their individual enclosures.  

“Each year, we’re learning more about these birds’ behaviours and needs, so that I can teach them how to be a shoebill. We have to set up these birds for success so they can live as wild shoebills,” says Maggie. 

Fledglings between seven and nine months old are fitted with GPS-tracking units to increase species knowledge before being released, whenever possible, during the fish ban when they’re less likely to encounter humans. 

“For me, success is when a released bird is afraid of humans. I want it to fly away,” she notes emphatically. 

The Shoebill Nest Protection Programme

The Shoebill Nest Protection Programme recruits up to 30 male community members to monitor any of the 15 active nest sites within the core breeding regions unevenly distributed across the wetlands. These nest guards remain in the nest area 24/7 during peak nesting season, between June and November, to protect the nests, eggs, chicks and adult birds. They send weekly updates and alert African Parks about any dangers and disturbances. 

Astridah Ndafi, Bangweulu Wetlands’ Shoebill Programme Supervisor and a Kopa community member, is on the other end of this communication. It takes her a day and a half to travel by car, motorised boat and a wooden mokoro from the captive rearing facility to the northern island chiefdoms for regular monitoring, where she sloshes through mud to check on these nests and collect data. 

She spends three months on the road during the fish ban visiting the six chiefdoms within the wetlands to conduct environmental education school programmes, community sensitisation and to mediate any disputes. 

“My role is to facilitate effective communication between the programme and the two nest technicians, nest guards, and thousands of community members to ensure they understand the long-term benefit of conserving shoebills and their habitat,” explains Astridah. 

“Working with these communities is not always easy. One has to be strong as not everyone understands our work at first. Many people didn’t see the benefit of conserving shoebills but with time, I’m seeing how people are changing their minds once I interact with them again,” she concludes. 

In 2023, breeding success at guarded nests soared from 31% to 77%, resulting in 10 wild chicks reaching maturity, alongside the release of 10 captive-reared fledglings since 2022.  

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