Morocco Centre going the distance to achieve a thriving houbara population

The Centre exhibited at the Abu Dhabi International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition until September 15, 2006.

The Centre's captive breeding programme has made tremendous progress and has already succeeded in creating a self-sustaining captive houbara population. Over the long term, the Centre is committed to restoring an unlimited houbara population in the wild. Despite the intense challenges of breeding this shy bird in captivity, the Centre is currently on target to meet its ambitious goal of producing 5,000 birds per year by 2008. So far the number of hatchlings has increased from 429 in 2000 to 3,866 in 2006.

"The ECWP houbara breeding project is an excellent example of the UAE's strategic efforts to integrate the three pillars of sustainable development: environmental protection, social development and economic development. We, at the ECWP, are very excited to have helped build this gateway to a thriving houbara population," said H.E Mohammad Al Bowardi, Secretary General of the Abu Dhabi Executive Council and Managing Director of the Environment Agency- Abu Dhabi.

The Centre's breeding complex is the headquarters of a vast network of specialised stations distributed over 40,000 km2 in Eastern Morocco. The integrated, state-of-the-art facilities use the latest scientific innovations to breed, acclimate and reintroduce houbara into the wild. After release, their movements are closely tracked and their behaviour is studied in their natural habitat. One of the project's successes is that it locally grows all the food required by the houbara population.

A second captive-breeding station was set up in 2005 with the potential to hatch an incredible 10,000 houbara per year by 2014. The network also includes two permanent field stations in Matarka and Bouarfa with pre-release and release facilities.

To promote genetic diversity in the breeding stock, 100 wild houbara eggs were annually collected between 2001 and 2005; however, for every wild egg collected, two captive-bred birds are released into the wild.

As of 2006, the breeding population totalled 3753 birds.

Another striking success is that the number of houbara released into the wild has climbed from two in 1998 to 2794 in 2006, which results in 5454 birds released since the beginning of the project.

Since the ECWP's primary objective is to restore a sustainable wild houbara population, tracking the released birds and monitoring their behaviour in their natural habitat is crucial. In studying the houbara's efforts to survive, ECWP scientists monitor everything from weather systems to vegetation and wildlife in the release areas.