The Little Bustard, a pheasant-sized bird native to Asia and southern Europe, has reached a nesting population of around 1,900 individuals in Kyrgyzstan this year. This marks a remarkable recovery, as the species was nationally extinct in the country less than 20 years ago.
The Little Bustard was listed as extinct in the Red Book of Kyrgyzstan in 2006. However, recent ornithological surveys have discovered breeding populations in the Chuy and Talas valleys in the north of the country, thought to be between 1,400 and 1,900 individuals.
Signs of a wider recovery first appeared in 2009, with the discovery of four nests in the Talas valley. In 2019 a nest outside Bishkek suggested that Little Bustards were returning to the Chuy valley.
Read my article Once Lost from Kyrgyzstan, Little Bustard Population Soars in Northern Valleys in The Times of Central Asia (10 October 2025).
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Jonathan Campion is a writer, journalist, editor and linguist, working in the Eurasia region. Read about his work here, and contact him here.
LIFE IN CENTRAL ASIA 