Hornbill queued up for Old Chang Kee, guarded Mackenzie Road carpark

Here's another community animal we can love.

Zhangxin Zheng | March 12, 2017, 01:17 PM

The Oriental Pied Hornbill is native to Singapore.

You might have seen these majestic birds around in Pulau Ubin or around Changi Village, if you are lucky.

After all, that's where our remaining population of hornbills are clustered.

What you might not know, though, is that there is at least one Oriental Pied Hornbill who lives near Little India on Mackenzie Road.

The elegant, stately bird, clearly a Singaporean, has proven itself to be a lover of Old Chang Kee.

A passerby, Kirby Ocastro, took a video and some photos of the bird, who initially waited patiently for service but gave up and strolled to the back:

[video width="640" height="1136" mp4="https://static.mothership.sg/1/2017/03/WhatsApp-Video-2017-03-09-at-3.34.54-PM.mp4"][/video]

 

"Hmm? Why got nobody ah?"

Here's him pacing around in front of the shop, hoping to be noticed:

Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro

Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro

Sadly, his great height and stately stature was insufficient to attract any staff's attention:

Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro Photo Courtesy of Kirby Ocastro

Here's our forlorn, Old Chang Kee-less friend up close:

Photo Courtesy of Lirene Bay Photo Courtesy of Lirene Bay

Aw. Somebody give him a curry puff already!

But this was a sighting on Tuesday, March 7. We were saying this guy lives here right?

 

Here are some other spots in the vicinity he's been spotted at before:

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And it even looks like our hornbill resident has found himself a job. He has been found standing guard at a MacKenzie Road carpark entrance:

Just chilling till the rain stops #hornbill #birdsofsingapore

A post shared by Peter Rushworth (@peterdrush) on

A post shared by Kenneth Kwok (@can0fcoke) on

 

And even has longtime friends:

met up with old friend whole on the way to work

A post shared by Jeffrey Iman (@jeffreyiman) on

Although we sure hope that thing he was chewing on wasn't something you fed him!

 

Clearly, therefore, this person's assumption of what's in his mind is incorrect:

I'm lost. Help! #wildlife #lost #blackwhite #capturethemoment #Xperia #sonyxperia

A post shared by Genevieve (@thsilentspeaker) on

 

Wittingly or not, this hornbill also naturally grew into a super-effective job as ambassador to the area, welcoming tourists and visitors by virtue of being so photogenic:

WELCOME TO SINGAPORE DON'T FORGET TO TOP UP YOUR CASH CARD............

A post shared by Miklo Vatos (@arifin24) on

As it turns out, there are actually two hornbills living in the area.

Kalai Vanan, Deputy Chief Executive of ACRES, told Mothership.sg it's possible they've been nesting in that vicinity.

"Thanks to previous attempts to increase their population through conservation efforts, we now get to see these beautiful animals up close in urban areas," he added.

The Oriental Pied Hornbill disappeared from Singapore in the mid-1800s, possibly due to poaching and habitat loss. Poaching of hornbills for their casques is still rampant around the world with some species driven to near-extinction.

A pair was first sighted on Pulau Ubin later in 1994, and since then, the population of Oriental Pied Hornbills in the wild revived from a few individuals at Pulau Ubin to over 100 of them across mainland Singapore, such as this pair at Mackenzie Road.

All this happened thanks to the efforts of the Singapore Hornbill Project.

The Oriental Pied Hornbills are important seed dispersers, which can eat and disperse bigger seeds that smaller birds cannot. They are omnivores that eat mainly fruit, but also insects and small animals -- so it's no surprise that they would be interested in the occasional Old Chang Kee too.

That said, let's try not to turn this into a macaque situation -- feeding hornbills with human food (or at all, actually) will reduce their natural fear of humans, develop a dangerous reliance on humans feeding them. At worst, it could degenerate into this:

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So folks, feel free to admire our hornbill friends as you please. Just don't feed them.

 

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Top photo collage courtesy of Facebook users Kirby Ocastro, Tan Ronnie and Instagram user peterdrush

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