Masked booby rescued from Magdalla in Surat

Surat: In a rare rescue, volunteers of an NGO working for environment conservation rescued a masked booby from Tapi river bank near Magdalla area in the city. The bird was in poor health when found a week back. However, it is now recovering at a shelter home and is likely to be released soon. Magdalla is about 10km from the Arabian Sea coastline.
“The masked booby is deep sea birds and never come on land. It spends its entire life in deep-sea and even lays eggs on small islands. But it is a mystery even for us as to how this bird reach here,” said Darshan Desai, volunteer of Prayas Team Environment.
He said that this was for the first time they had rescued a masked booby. It was also challenging for the NGO volunteers as well
When found, it was sitting on the ground. From its behaviour, experts believe that it must have been exhausted due to continuous flying for many hours against the wind. Colour of the bird’s feathers suggested that it was a young bird and not fully matured.
“This bird is known for its diving skills. It can dive over 10-feet deep in water to catch fish. It never comes on land but maybe it got dragged on to land with wind current,” Desai said.
“The bird is recovering and now it has started moving its wings. Earlier, it was unable to fly despite keeping it in open. Now, it is kept in a cage till its release,” he added.
“So far its rescue or presence was not been reported in this side of the country. We are now working on options to release it safely in a manner so that it can reach back to its natural habitat,” Desai said.