Hummingbird lost, hummingbird found
March 17, 2015 4:53 PM   Subscribe

"An intense and prolonged dry season in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta combined with fires set by Kogi indigenous people for agricultural purposes has devastated its fragile high-elevation habitat (páramo), home to a suite of endemic plants and animals. Two conservationists Carlos Julio Rojas and Christian Vasquez who work at ProAves’ “El Dorado” nature reserve in the mountain range, carried out investigations to document the fires. On March 4th 2015, the photographed the spectacular Blue-bearded Helmetcrest – a hummingbird that was last seen in 1946 and feared quite possibly extinct. Unfortunately, the habitat of the three birds they saw is threatened by ongoing fires."

“I saw the flash of a bird screeching past me and saw it perch on a bush nearby. I managed to take a quick photo of it before it flew off. I then reviewed the photo on the camera screen and immediately recognized the strikingly patterned hummingbird as the long-lost Blue-bearded Helmetcrest – I was ecstatic!! After reports of searches by ornithologists failing to find this spectacular species, Christian and I were the first people alive to see it for real.”

Full report (pdf)
posted by gingerbeer (6 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
Mod note: Fixed the second link, put the generic site in the first one - if you wanted something specific, gingerbeer, let me know!
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 5:24 PM on March 17, 2015


It's beautiful. I'm going to miss it.
posted by BlueHorse at 5:44 PM on March 17, 2015


Oh jesus christ I'm sorry but today has been depressing enough. Please don't tell me in one breath that a hummingbird I never knew existed will be extinguished in my stupid flicker of awareness.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 5:55 PM on March 17, 2015 [1 favorite]


"Sir, we've photographed the Blue-bearded Helmetcrest! But there's good news and bad news... "

"Wow! I thought it was extinct!"

"That's the good news. It wasn't!"

"It's not extinct!"

"That's the bad news..."

Shades of The Ugly Chickens...
posted by Devonian at 6:46 PM on March 17, 2015 [2 favorites]


Oh god.
posted by rtha at 7:19 PM on March 17, 2015


What is more depressing is that this is one of the pretty animals. How many less picturesque animals are struggling to survive, about to fall off the cliff into extinction?
posted by vacapinta at 2:45 AM on March 18, 2015


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