The first sarus crane nest spotted during the 2021 breeding season was later found destroyed by wild pigs, according to an NGO on July 15.

BirdLife International Cambodia Programme said the nest was originally found with two eggs on June 25 by a biodiversity monitoring team in Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary of the Kingdom’s northeast corridor.

Field staff later travelled to the area on a regular monitoring trip and appointed a nest guardian, it said.

“However on the day the guardian start[ed] his work, we found the nest was destroyed with evidence of the remaining eggshell and traces of wild pigs around,” BirdLife Cambodia said, adding that the team later concurred that feral hogs were indeed behind the incident.

“This was a second nest found in this wildlife sanctuary in the last three years, the first nest was found in 2019,” it said, adding that it met a similar fate.

According to BirdLife Cambodia, the sanctuary’s grasslands are “an important nesting habitat of [the] sarus crane, however, the risk is high due to the increase in the level of disturbance”.

The NGO said it and rangers of the Ratanakkiri and Mondulkiri provincial environment departments stationed at the sanctuary “have worked hard to protect this key habitat”, inviting the general public to “help us to protect the vulnerable sarus crane”.

The sarus crane (Antigone antigone) is listed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species as “vulnerable”.

According to the Wildlife Conservation Society, the crane stands up to 165cm tall, making it the tallest flying bird.

“Its global population is rapidly declining due to widespread degradation and destruction of wetland habitats, human exploitation, and the effects of pollutants and poisons,” it said.

The global population is between 13,000 and 15,000, according to the latest BirdLife International figures.