When Rajshahi Medical College Hospital authorities felled a tree on Saturday afternoon, it still housed a couple of nests for Asian open-bill storks. The tree felling was part of an RMCH project, which envisages chopping down around 50 trees to clear space for constructing a garage and a drain to solve the problem of waterlogging in the area. But the development work comes at the cost of avian lives, as nearly a hundred of the Asian open-bill storks and their offspring have already died.
On Saturday afternoon, some 30 storks and their chicks died after falling off the felled tree. Labourers and locals picked up around 30 more storks and took them home, while some 20 storks were slaughtered on the spot. More than 20 others were seen lying dead around the tree. Zoologists said indiscriminate felling of trees is severely damaging for the bird species of the area, especially during the current breeding season. In addition, bird nests on nearby trees have also become vulnerable to winds. Rather than destroying lives this way, the authorities could have taken measured steps in coordination with experts and environmentalists. Bird species including Asian open-bill stork, cormorants, black crowned night heron, and crows have been nesting on RMCH’s trees for many years.
Storks breed between June and November while herons and cormorants between March and October. We are not saying development activities should be stopped, we just want them to be carried out sustainably, in the months when the breeding season is over. The earth is not only for human beings, rather all the species here live in harmony following the food chain and ecology. Every species has a significant role in the grand system of the earth. Humans are undoubtedly responsible for the earth, all creatures, and sustainable development. Our mindless infrastructural development at the cost of other species however is at the end self-destructive.
