Hai-Bar: A Zoological Time Capsule

Hai-Bar Yotvata Nature Reserve is a protected area and safari park dedicated to breeding and restoring populations of animals common in Israel during biblical times. Managed by the Israeli Parks Authority, the park specializes in breeding species that are rare or extinct in modern Israel, and has provided animals for re-introduction in many parts of the Middle East.

We entered the park at exactly the right time, when the animals were receiving their morning feeding from a truck driving along the safari route. We were thus able to get an up-close view of the various species in the park. They have several types of large ungulates (hooved herbivores), most of which are vulnerable, endangered or extinct in the wild due to overhunting in their native ranges.

A group of white oryx, once hunted to extinction in the wild but now with recovering numbers due to a successful reintroduction program conducted by several countries.

A group of addax eating and sheltering under an acacia tree. Addax, also known as screwhorn antelopes, are critically endangered throughout their range due to unrestricted hunting but once ranged from the Sahara northward to Israel. There are now less than 500 in the wild and less than 2000 more in captive breeding programs. Note the twisted horn of the one individual to the far right.

The Somali wild ass is native to the Horn of Africa and has never been present in Israel, but as less than 1000 are present in the wild, the Israeli Parks Authority has participated in their captive breeding program, in hopes to reintroduce breeding pairs to bolster the critically endangered species.

The ungulates were graceful and beautiful to behold, but the ostriches were by far the main attraction of the park. The Syrian ostrich (Struthio camelus syriacus), is known from historical Roman, Egyptian, Arab and Jewish descriptions but was driven extinct in the mid-20th century. Hai Bar hosts a population of the larger African common ostrich (Struthio camelus). The ostriches followed and pecked our cars, curious about whether we had food to provide them. They truly are magnificent creatures and a powerful reminder that birds deserve their official taxonomic status as dinosaurs.

We enjoyed our safari tour through Hai-Bar, getting a tour of the past (and hopefully future) wildlife of the Negev. Driving through, we could see that far from being a wasteland, the deserts of the Middle East can support a diverse and charismatic fauna, if we give the populations of these animals the chance to recover their numbers.