I HAD a distress call from Margate the other day, someone who’s umdoni tree (a waterberry), which used to be home to nesting hadedas and louries, has been taken over by Indian mynahs (actually, the tree is next door, but it grows over her property and she loves it, as an umdoni should be loved).
She was very annoyed, particularly by the mynahs constant cackling and screeching and the fact that they had chased away the hadedas and the louries, and she wanted to know what to do about it. The answer is, I’m afraid, nothing much that’s legal. I phoned our local bird fundi, Andy Ruffle of Birdlife Trogons, to ask his advice and he basically said the same thing, but he did come up with the idea of trying to hose them out of the tree. He said the mynahs would not enjoy this and may take the hint. I’m sure it’s worth a try.
The Indian mynahs have been creeping southwards from Durban for years, but I was distressed to hear that they had reached Margate, just 15 kilometres north of us. I told Andy this and that so far we were mynah-free, and he pointed out that they tended to enjoy the town environment (that’s why I call them urban squatters) and particularly exotic gardens, and being pretty much in an indigenous jungle where we are, we should be comparatively safe. I certainly hope so.
When we lived in Joburg we tried everything, legal and otherwise, to get rid of them because they were a real pest. No one, however, suggested hosing them, which is a pity, but the trouble is that they are highly intelligent birds and the moment I stepped into the garden they would take evasive action. Anyway, we were quite fortunate in that our garden was very much a jungle and so we managed to keep our other birds as well. But never under estimate that intelligence and remember that they can be taught to speak as readily as parrots.
The Indian mynah arrived in South Africa as an illegal immigrant in the 1800s, probably as uninvited passengers on the ships plying between the two countries, and as illegal immigrants tend to do, it stayed and spread. Today they can be found over much of the eastern parts of the country. In India itself there are many different mynahs, including the common mynah, which is now almost certainly ours too, which is described as, ‘Bold, aggressive and inquisitive, even entering houses’, – beware, reader in Margate! Others are the bank mynah, the jungle mynah, the white-vented mynah and the hill mynah. No shortage of mynahs in India.
Finally, it sometimes helps to complain. I signed an international petition last month to stop the authorities at the Sochi Winter Olympics in Russia from rounding up all stray dogs and cats and killing them. Such was the response that the programme was stopped and the authorities are instead building a shelter for stray animals. Now isn’t that good news? Cheers!
* Birds of India, Bikram Grewal etc, Helm, London, 2002.
