#sihek

[scottpartridge]

Week 2 of #BirdArtWeekly hosted by @migratorymay and Day 19 of #drawtober#extinctbirds2025 hosted by @smallerdelusions is the Sihek or Guam Kingfisher (Todiramphus cinnamonminus), extinct in the wild on Guam but holding on in captivity.

Day 19 of a#birdtoberclub2025 hosted by @kaylafiskbirds is Smallest in their Family, for which I picked the Little Auk or Dovekie, and this is also my lone post for the og tober challenge #inktober which is #arctic today.

Day 19 of #birdtober2025 hosted by @aholmesartstudio is Red-Footed Booby (including a #ripple for #[email protected] )

Day 19 of #birdtober25 hosted by @birdsnotmosquitoes and @alohaposthi is Maui ʻĀkepa + Star

[nagunkgunk]

RISE RISE RISE RISE

[smallerdelusions]

Meet the Sihek, Day 19 of the Extinct Bird Drawtober!

Pictured with the Rota Blue Damselfly. Both are native to Guam: a small island in the Western Pacific. Travel to the island post-WWII introduced the brown tree snake who, in absence of natural predators, caused local extinctions of almost every terrestrial animal on Guam. The snakes were so numerous they regularly caused power outages. Almost all bird species disappeared.

Twenty-eight individual Sihek were captured before the species was declared extinct in the wild in 1988. The next forty years saw the species slowly repopulate in captivity. Though the brown tree snakes are not gone from Guam, the island continues to reduce their population. In 2024, the Sihek Recovery Program released nine Sihek on nearby Palmyra Atoll to encourage a new wild population in hopes that they may someday be returned to Guam

In 2025, the project reported three nests of wild eggs for the first time in my lifetime.

[norzyczki]

From top left corner:

1. Kiritimati sandpiper (day 16)

2. Canary island oystercatcher (day 17)

3. Sihek (day 19) I love this one

4. Night parrot (day 21)

5. Tutururu dove (day 20)

[tinylongwing]

Trick or treat!

Happy halloween, kookaburra! I don't actually have any kookaburra photos (never banded in Australia or Papua New Guinea, which is a shame) BUT I do have plenty of other large kingfishers! Here's a gorgeous juvenile male sihek (Mariana Kingfisher), banded in 2010 on Saipan. The little silver spots on his wing are what let us know he's a juvenile - adults don't have those!

[dusky-doe]

Collection of Sihek.

Guam kingfishers (Sihek) are extinct in the wild, but hopefully not for long! Within a few months, several should be released on the Palmyra atoll by the Sihek Recovery Project, a joint effort of a number of zoos and government organizations.

I've had the privileged of working with Sihek through an internship at one such institution, and through doing video analysis for a study. I love these funky little guys, and I hope they do well in the wild.

The top one is holding a brown tree snake, their primary threat and reason for their conservation status. The bottom 4 are just little doodles of some of my favorite positions they sit in. They are so top heavy, with huge beaks and tiny little feet. It's always hilarious when they scratch themselves with their toes. I've even seem them tip over when landing because of that massive head.

[stickyswords]

Extinct Birds Day 19: Sihek

[sumahi]

My family and I made a Chamoru language flash card set for the birds from the Marianas. Many of the native birds are no longer found in Guam and in the wild (such as this one the sihek) and so this is an important way we can pass on knowledge of the animals and their importance to our people.