The great bustard can weigh up to 15kg.GREAT bustard chicks that will see the species return to Salisbury Plain after an absence of 175 years are starting to hatch in Russia.

So far, 14 chicks are doing well and enthusiasts are waiting for a further 35 eggs to hatch.

The project is the result of five years' work by the Salisbury-based Great Bustard Group, which received a licence to reintroduce the species last November.

Weighing up to 15kg, great bustards are the world's heaviest flying bird.

They became extinct in Britain in the 1830s because they were hunted for their meat.

Members of the group are now in the Saratov region of Russia using a host of imaginative means to ensure the birds can survive on their own in the wild.

Local sculptor Simon Gudgeon has produced two hand puppets of a bustard head, so that the chicks identify their with own species, rather than humans, and scientists dress in white sheets when they approach the young birds.

Foxes are one of the bustard's main enemies and experts are experimenting with ways of keeping the chicks away, including squirting them with water pistols if they get too close to their predators.

"We have never had a project like this before and a lot of different people are coming together to ensure that it works," said treasurer of the group Karen Ray.

"It's getting very exciting now - we just hope all this hard work pays off."

The chicks will arrive on Salisbury Plain on June 23 and spend a month in quarantine before moving to a large enclosure.