LAST CHANCE TO SEE? THE CRITICALLY ENDANGERED LESSER FLORICAN

July 30, 2026

by Mark Beaman

Lesser Florican male displaying in late July 2026 (image by Mark Beaman)

Once upon a time, the arrival of the monsoon rains in Northwestern India heralded the arrival of tens of thousands of Lesser Floricans (known as the Likh in Hindi) in the parched grasslands of Northwestern India. Their dramatic jumping display, which involved the males hurling themselves into the air above the grasslands or small fields of crops, was known to every farmer and shepherd over vast swathes of the region.

No more!

Over the last fifty years, the increasing intensification of agriculture, including heavy spraying with pesticides and herbicides, and the dramatic overgrazing of grasslands and, in many cases, their total destruction, has left this wonderful but tragic little bustard with almost nowhere safe to breed or indeed to winter. In consequence, numbers have crashed. In the last 20 years alone, the population may have fallen by over 90 per cent, on top of a huge but unstudied decrease over the previous decades.

In a well-known area in Rajasthan, the best site in the entire state, the number of returning males has fallen from over 100 less than two decades ago to just three individuals by late July this year!!

Very few breeding locations are currently known, and at the only other significant site, which is in Gujarat but is closed to visitors, the decline has been equally dramatic; from 120 males around 20 years ago to under 10 now!

If you would like to see this Critically Endangered bird, which is surely at risk of extinction in the short term, we have Lesser Florican special tours in late July 2027 and 2028. All profits from these tours will be donated to the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), which is the lead organisation monitoring the last known sites, wardening them and doing its best to educate local people to leave a little space for these beautiful and charismatic birds. We can only wish them success. It is five minutes to midnight for the Lesser Florican.

Details of the tours can be found here.