THE survival of tropical rainforests in Africa may depend on a toucan-like
bird called the hornbill.
The African hornbill species Ceratogymna atrata and C.
cylindricus eat the fruit of tropical trees and spread the seeds in their
faeces. But they were thought to disperse seeds only over relatively short
Now Kenneth Whitney and Thomas Smith of the University of California at Davis
have found that hornbills can travel more than 150 kilometres and disperse the
seeds of a quarter of all known tree species in the rainforest (Animal
Conservation, vol 1, p 107).
As habitat destruction and hunting kill off other seed dispersers such as
elephants and primates, Smith says, the hornbill will play a key role in the
regeneration of forests.