The last Indian grey hornbill was seen in the Gir forest, India, in the 1930s. By the 1950s and 1960s, the species had completely disappeared from the area, probably due to hunting. For decades, those centuries-old trees were left without their original inhabitants.
Everything changed in 2021, when the Gujarat Forest Department, together with Jaipal Singh and other conservationists, released 28 hornbills in the park. Twelve more arrived in 2023, bringing the total to around 40 reintroduced birds. They chose them carefully: mature, large-diameter trees, such as Sterculia urens, became their new homes.
Today, four years later, these birds are already breeding on their own, feeding their chicks with banyan and peepal fruits without relying on further releases. The scientists who published the study in October 2025 confirm it: the population is self-sustaining. A forest has regained something it had been waiting 60 years for.
