A new study finds that five bird subspecies may already be extinct The rampant and illegal trade in caged birds threatens to drive at least 13 Indonesian species into extinction, a new study finds. The list includes the national bird of Indonesia, the Javan hawk-eagle (Nisaetus bartelsi), as well as the silvery woodpigeon (Columba argentina), helmeted hornbill (Rhinoplax vigil), yellow-crested cockatoo (Cacatua sulphurea), scarlet-breasted lorikeet (Trichoglossus forsteni), Javan green magpie (Cissa thalassina), black-winged myna (Acridotheres melanopterus), Bali myna (Leucopsar rothschildi), straw-headed bulbul (Pycnonotus zeylanicus), Javan white-eye (Zosterops flavus), rufous-fronted laughingthrush (Garrulax rufifrons), Sumatran laughingthrush (Garrulax bicolor) and Java sparrow (Lonchura oryzivora). Many of these species now have just a couple of dozen individuals left in the wild, according to the paper, published in the journal Forktail.

More than 25,000 birds from nearly 150 species, including those on the brink of extinction, were found for sale at hundreds of shops across Indonesian Borneo, according to a recent report. The report is said to be the first to provide data on the trade in Kalimantan, which is increasingly being targeted by trappers and traders who have decimated bird populations in Java and Sumatra. The researchers are calling for more surveys on bird populations in the wild and stronger law enforcement to protect endangered species. JAKARTA — Tens of thousands of birds, many of them protected species on the brink of extinction, are being openly traded in Indonesian Borneo, in the first clear picture to emerge of the extent of the practice there. Nearly 200 stores across the region, known as Kalimantan, were found to be selling more than 25,000 birds from 148 species, according to multiple periodic field surveys carried out by the conservation group Planet Indonesia between July 2015 and February 2017. “This is the first data that we know of about the wild bird trade from Kalimantan,” said Adam Miller, the group’s executive director, in a statement announcing the findings.

Indonesia has a long history of keeping birds as pets, but now it’s driving many species to the brink. By Rachael Bale Indonesians on the island of Java have an old saying: A man is considered to be a real man if he has a house, a wife, a horse, a keris (dagger), and a bird. The sprawling island nation is home to more than 1,600 species of birds, more than almost any other country in the world. It’s also home to the greatest number of species that are threatened by the bird trade. Now a new study highlights just how severe a threat the pet trade is to Indonesia’s birds. The study, released Wednesday, has identified 13 species and another 14 subspecies that are at risk of extinction because of the pet trade. “The number one thing I want people to know is that the bird trade is an incredibly urgent issue that needs addressing,” said Chris Shepherd, one of the study’s authors and the Southeast Asian regional director for TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring organization. “It is a conservation crisis that is being ignored.”

National Geographic and partners have declared 2018 the Year of the Bird. Why? They help the environment, but they also help our souls. In 2018 we’ll explore the wonder of birds, and why we can’t live without them. By: Jonathan Franzen For most of my life, I didn’t pay attention to birds. Only in my 40s did I become a person whose heart lifts whenever he hears a grosbeak singing or a towhee calling and who hurries out to see a golden plover that’s been reported in the neighborhood, just because it’s a beautiful bird, with truly golden plumage, and has flown all the way from Alaska. When someone asks me why birds are so important to me, all I can do is sigh and shake my head, as if I’ve been asked to explain why I love my brothers. And yet the question is a fair one, worth considering in the centennial year of America’s Migratory Bird Treaty Act: Why do birds matter?