14 Review of Madagascar’s wildfowl
©Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust
Wildfowl
(2013) 63: 5–23
ducks until recently, it is perhaps
unsurprising that management plans have
not yet been developed for the species.
Moreover, of greater concern, none of the
species were legally protected (see Dee
1986) until new laws were passed protecting
the endemic taxa in 2006. Although a
statutory hunting season existed for
wildfowl in Madagascar this was rarely
enforced and practically impossible to police
in a country where subsistence hunting
represents a far greater threat to ducks than
sport hunting (Young 1996).
Wetlands too were poorly protected with
almost none of any note within
Madagascar’s original network of reserves
and national parks (Langrand & Wilmé
1993; Langrand & Goodman 1995; Young
1996). Very small numbers of Madagascar
Teal and Meller’s Duck have been found in
protected areas (
e.g
.
A. bernieri
in Kirindy
Mitea National Park and
A. melleri
in
Ranomafana NP and Zahamena NP; H.G.
Young pers. sources; Table 3 and Fig. 3) but
this is more by luck than judgement. From
the 1990s onwards there was pressure from
many sources to try to redress this
imbalance in protected areas. Important
progress was made when Madagascar
joined the Convention on Wetlands of
International Importance especially as
Waterfowl
Habitat
(the
“Ramsar
Convention”) in 1999 and subsequently
designated nine Ramsar sites (Ramsar 2013;
Table 3). While Ramsar designation may not
provide wildfowl at a site with direct
protection, the process is indicative of a
desire by Madagascar to improve the status
of wetlands and their natural inhabitants.
In 2003, the President of Madagascar,
Marc Ravalomanana, promised to increase
his country’s protected areas from 1.7
million to 6.0 million ha (Norris 2006) – the
“Durban Vision”. This increase will see the
development of several new National Parks
and has already included the newly
protected areas of Menabe Antimena, the
Manambolomaty Complex and the Kinkony
Mahavavy Complex, which all hold
significant numbers of waterbirds including
breeding and non-breeding
A. bernieri
(Table 3, Fig. 3). Several leading non-
government organisations (NGOs) are
currently establishing plans for further
protected areas with the Madagascar
government.
Since its rediscovery in 2006, the
precarious survival chances of the tiny
remnant population of Madagascar Pochard
has prompted the establishment of wide-
ranging programme of conservation
initiatives coordinated by a partnership
of local and international specialists
(Durrell, WWT, The Peregrine Fund, Asity
Madagascar and the Government of
Madagascar). This programme has included
establishment of the lakes and surrounding
forest near Bemanevika as a New Protected
Area (an initial level of protection in the
process of fully ratifying the protection of
site) (Table 3, Fig. 3) by The Peregrine Fund,
the establishment of a field-based research
team (including Malagasy PhD projects), a
regional education awareness programme
and development of a local captive-breeding
programme. Three clutches of eggs were
collected in the wild in October and
November 2009 (Donald
et al
. 2010) and the
first captive-bred duckling from this project
hatched in September 2011 at a purpose-
