I Decided to Released My Father’s Sacred Kingfishers
By: Esti Dhamayanti
Tags: Natural Habitat, Birds, Environment, Conservation, Kingfisher

Two days after my father bought them, we went home. On our way home from Magelang to Bogor, we have to stop several times at the nearest rest area to feed them. Even I have to put them on my lap and keep them warm on their tiny bamboo basket nest. While waiting for my father to perform Friday prayer somewhere in Bekasi mosque, some children curiously were watching me feeding those birdies.

I amazed by how fast they grow. Their mesmerizing metallic blue-green feather started to develop and their bodies were getting bigger rapidly. Moreover, they even start to fly around inside the house, so my father and I decided to move them into a larger nest as they grow bigger.

After they were fully grown, my father and I stopped hand feeding them and put them into a cage. However, I saw them ‘unhappiness’ in their eyes. I thought that they want to be free as they are in their natural habitat. Fly so high in the sky and catch a fish in a clear river and build their own ‘tribes’.

I told my mother that they need to be released, yet my mother was afraid whether will they get sufficient food? My father also disagrees with that idea because he wanted to train them like videos of sacred kingfisher owners he saw on YouTube. Unfortunately, one day, the smallest one died on the cage. After I necropsied his/her bodies, I assumed that he/she did not get enough food because he/she was uncompetitive rather than his/her siblings. It was a heartbreaking day for me.

After about two days of thinking, my mother finally agrees to release them rather than to see them unhappy locked up inside the cage. She told me that she remembers based on the Quran, God already granted sustenance for every living creatures in the world. I was relieved and then release them. I was watching them fly until they were gone.

“There is not a single moving creature on the earth but Allah is responsible for providing its sustenance. Allah knows where it dwells and where it will permanently rest. All this is recorded in a clear Book.” — (Surah Hud 11:6)

Indeed, at first, my father was upset, but he started to accept that because those sacred kingfishers continually perch on the high voltage electricity cable high above our house one or two times a week. Two weeks ago I started noticed that they already have another friend or maybe one of their mate. So now there are three sacred kingfishers again!

I might be a bit ‘successful’ to give them the freedom they deserve, yet I cannot lie that I am afraid with human activities which cause deterioration of air, water, and their natural habitat will threaten them. Furthermore, rampant poaching of this majestic bird will decrease their population in their habitat.

Their existence when they are singing happily once or twice in the morning far above my house become a friendly reminder for me to be more conscious about my action that will affect the environment. I think it is an obligation for every human not only to provide/prepare our future generation with a world they deserve but also for those critters that need our attention and protection.