Development of coordinated genetic and demographic breeding programmes

Abstract

There are some early examples of the potential of captive breeding in zoos for preventing extinction of highly endangered species. Species such as Przewalski’s horse (Equus przewalskii), Père David’s deer (Elaphurus davidianus), Hawaiian goose (Branta sandvicensis) and a number of others would no longer exist but for the fact that their populations were maintained and propagated for many decades in captivity. However, the concept that zoos could serve the goal of preserving biological species through propagation of captive stock at a more than incidental scale is much more recent. The zoo world, aroused by the rapidly accelerating destruction of the world’s habitats and increasing loss of biological diversity, started to explore this idea and its consequences only some 20 years ago. This resulted in the organization of the first cooperative and coordinated breeding programmes in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Since then, considerable progress has been made with respect to theoretical considerations, practical implications and organizational structures required. Simultaneously the number of captive breeding programmes has increased exponentially. It can now be stated beyond doubt that captive propagation potentially constitutes one of the important tools in conservation of biological diversity (e.g. Foose, Seal and Flesness, 1987).