Important Considerations for Intensive

Management of Endangered Species

✔ Often managers rush into intensive management for a
quick, high profile fix of a declining species
✔ Before captive propagation, reintroduction, and
translocation are considered four general areas should
be addressed (Kleiman et al. 1994)
– Condition of the Species
– Environmental Conditions
– Biopolitical Considerations
– Biological Knowledge
Removing the Cause of Decline
✔ This is really the crux of endangered species
conservation
✔ Requires detailed observation and likely
experimentation to fully understand reason for
decline
– Brown tree snake was not immediately recognized
– Condor limiting factors required telemetry to ID
• not 1080, not disturbance at nest, not shooting, likely lead
poison because Condors need open habitat to find food and
hunters/ranchers common there
Facing the Evil Quartet
✔ Typically we are up against
– habitat destruction/degradation
– exotics
– trophic cascades
– overharvest
– contaminants
✔ Contaminants and overharvest are easiest to remove
or reduce
Recovery after Agent of Decline
Removed
✔ Stop Over harvest
– whales, alligator
✔ Remove Pesticides
– Peregrine, Bald Eagle, Brown Pelican
✔ Remove Pesticides and Modify Habitat Needs
– Mauritius Kestrel (Jones et al. 1991)
• 1974-----4 birds
• 1991-----127-145 birds
Exotics are Very Difficult to
Control
✔ Disease, Snakes
– Technology not adequate to control
– Buy time by “marooning” (Williams 1977)
• release small numbers of species with poor dispersal
ability in isolated habitat (typically islands)
• 700 islands off New Zealand
– Saddleback, Kakapo (flightless parrot), Takahe (Rail)
• Buys time until feral introduced mammals can be removed
• Guam Rail released on Rota
 Are We Treating the Symptom or
the Cause of the Problem?
✔ Often rush into captive propagation without addressing
limiting factor
– “Headstarting” Sea Turtles (Tate 1990)
• rear until old enough to avoid predation on nesting grounds
• Better to protect nesting ground
– Hatcheries and barges for Salmon
• damns, habitat loss, fishing, etc are cause
– May be justified to learn about propagation and control
• Mariana Crow
A Complex Example of
Addressing Limiting Factors
✔ Rhinos in Africa http://gurukul.ucc.american.edu
/Ted/RHINOBLK.HTM
✔ Destruction of habitat, hunting, illegal trade in products (folk
medicine, dagger handles)
– reduction in numbers from 65,000-100,000 in 1960s to ~3,000 today
• regulations (CITES)
• scientific study of medicinal effects
• Leader of Yehman using agate handle dagger
• shoot to kill poacher policy
• De-horning
• Ranching to flood market
Little Progress with Rhinos
✔ Can’t change old beliefs quickly
– medicinal effects of horn
✔ Value of horn in poor countries makes risk of death worth it
✔ De-horning not very effective (Berger 1998, Rachlow and Berger 1997)
– grow back (possible sustainable harvest?)
– killed out of spite
– even small portion of horn near skull valuable
– dehorned mothers less able to defend calfs from hyenas
✔ Need to work at both ends of trade routes
Hope with One-horned Rhinos
(Dinerstein 2003)

✔ Rhinos in India-Nepal are increasing with creation of

Royal Chitwan National Park
– Community pride, ecotourism, natural resource benefits to
residents, Royal family of Nepal leadership
✔ General approach
– Design landscapes with large, protected cores
– Introduce powerful economic incentives, legislation,
awareness
– Identify bold leadership to rally political will
• Translocation
• Redistribution of park revenue to locals
• Resettlement or land transfer
How Do We Protect or Restore
Enough Habitat?
✔ Biopolitical Considerations (Kleiman et al. 1994)
– No negative impact for locals
– Community support exists
– GOs and NGOs supportive/involved
✔ But what about when there is an obvious Economic
Cost?
– Especially when habitat is already being used by humans
• Salmon
Captive Breeding and Reintroduction
✔ Once the limiting factors have been addressed it
might be time for intensive management
– last resort
– expensive
– difficult to make succeed
• Beck et al. 1994-- 11% successful
• Griffith et al. 1989-- 19% successful
– requires large, long-term effort in captivity and the wild
Typical Questions About Captive
Propagation
✔ Is it necessary?
✔ Is it successful and worth it?
✔ How do you do it?
– Technical questions about breeding, rearing,
and release
Intensive Management Programs
are Complex
Example from Mariana
Crow program on Guam

•landowner coordination
•monitoring
•pull eggs
•rear nestlings
•translocate
•hack to the wild
•control predators
Why Captive Breed?
✔ Produce stock for reintroduction (Wilson and
Stanley Price 1994)
✔ Preserve genetic variability
✔ Produce stock for research
✔ Produce animals for public education
✔ Provide insurance against extinction
– alala pva
What are We Breeding in
Captivity?
✔ (Ginsberg 1994, Canids)
✔ Reviewed species bred in
captivity (N = 32) from
1971-1990.
✔ Most are common species
3 endangered species account ✔ Increase in vulnerable and
for 95% of litters for V&E endangered species in late
species (Maned Wolf, Af. Wild 1980s
Dog, and Bush Dog)
75% of all captive breeding is
done on 3 species (grey wolf,
red fox, dingo)
Criteria to Meet Prior to
Reintroduction (Kleiman et al. 1994)
✔ Already discussed environmental and
political considerations

✔ Condition of the species

– Is there a need to increase numbers, populations,
or genetic diversity of the species?
– Is appropriate stock available?
– Will introduction jeopardize wild population?
Criteria to Meet Prior to
Reintroduction (Kleiman et al. 1994)
✔ Biological and Other Resources
– Do we know how to rear and reintroduce the
species?
– Do we know enough about the biology of the
species to determine if we have been
successful?
– Is funding for the long term available
• includes monitoring success of reintroduction
Example of Meeting Criteria for
Tamarins (Kleiman et al. 1994)
Golden Golden
-headed
Condition of species
1. Need to augment wild pop. Yes No
2. Available stock Yes Yes
3. No jeopardy to wild pop. ? ?
Environmental conditions
1. Causes of decline removed ? No
2. Sufficient protected habitat Yes? No
3. Unsaturated habitat Yes Yes?
Biopolitical conditions
1. No negative impacts for locals No ?
2. Community support exists 5 2
3. GOs/NGOs supportive/involved Yes Yes
4. Conformity with laws/regulations Yes ?
Biological or other resources
1. Reintroduction technology known 4 3
2. Knowledge of species' biology 5 1.4
3. Sufficient resources exist for program Yes No
Recommend reintroduction/translocation? Yes No
Assessment of Reintroduction
Projects (Beck et al. 1994)
% of Projects

✔ Reviewed projects from 1900 to 1993

– N=145 projects, 13 million animals of 126 species
– acclimate = hard vs. soft release
 What Made Project Successful?

✔ Successful if N=500 w/o human intervention or PVA looks good

✔ 16 (11%) successful
✔ Training, local involvement, education, and duration are consistently important
 Criteria for Success from Griffith
et al. (1989)
✔ Type of species (game more successful than threatened)
✔ Habitat quality (better success into good habitat)
✔ Location of release (better in core of historic range)
✔ Source of stock (Wild caught better than hand-reared)
✔ Food habits (herbivore better than carnivore or omnivore)
✔ Duration of study (longer and more animals released
increased success)
Size and Persistence of Release
Matters (Ginsberg 1994)
✔ PVA model results (Kit
Foxes)
N=50 ✔ N=Starting pop size
✔ SP=successive releases of
N=100 20 indiv/yr for 10 years
N=500 ✔ Huge increase in viability
with little increase in per
year release effort.
Successive Releases
N=50SP; N=100SP
 Major Drawbacks to Success
(Snyder et al. 1996)
✔ Need to maintain a self sustaining captive population
✔ Need to successfully reintroduce
✔ May get domestication and disease in captivity
✔ Need considerable funds and facilities
✔ Diverts attention from long-term solution in the field
(easy to do quick fix)
✔ Need consistent administration (Clark et al. 1994)
The Biology of Captive
Propagation and Reintroduction
✔ Captive Breeding
– zoo biology and husbandry
✔ Manipulating Wild Pairs
– pull clutch
✔ Captive Rearing
– considerations of diet, disease, training
✔ Reintroduction
– translocation, fostering, hacking (soft release), hard
release
A General Captive Propagation
Program
✔ Aplomado falcons (Cade et al. 1991)
• bring birds in from captivity
– acclimate so they breed in captivity
– increase productivity by food supplementation and clutch manipulation
– hand rear young, experiment with parent rearing
• manipulate wild pairs
– clutch manipulation
• hack out captive-reared birds
– meet recovery goal for species
– 30-50 young released for 10-15 years
– require 15 pairs (35 individuals)
How to Incubate Eggs?

✔ An example of figuring out one aspect of captive

propagation
✔ Use of surrogate species
✔ Need controlled experiments
Effects of Manipulating Wild
Pairs
✔ Bald Eagles (Wood and Collopy 1993)
– 78% renested within 1 month
– subsequent reproduction within the year may be reduced
• this was modeled with RAMAS age model and was estimated not to affect
viability of “donor” population

✔ Corvids (Marzluff et al. 1994)

– 69% renested
– reduced clutch size on renesting and slightly lower number of
fledglings
– occupancy and productivity at manipulated sites was same as
controls next year
Hand-rearing May Produce
Undersized Young for Release
✔ Growth is usually faster in
nature and may produce light-
weight young (magpies)
✔ Growth in captivity may be
compensatory (crows)
✔ If dominance is related to size,
then survival or breeding may
be reduced
– Whitmore and Marzluff 1998
Raising Mammals in Captivity
✔ Hand-rearing diets for
Elk wild ungulate neonates
– used ad lib feeding of
evaporated milk
– easy and growth
similar to wild
Big-horn
• Wild et al. 1994.

Pronghorn
Practice Makes More Perfect
✔ Mortality of pups is
reduced with
increasing number of
litters produced for a
species
– 3 outliers were
removed from
analysis??)
– Ginsberg 1994
Ferret Predatory Behavior Is
Influenced by Rearing
✔ Vargas 1994
– % of ferrets that killed PDs at 16.5 weeks
– Group I
• cage-raised, no exposure to live prey
– Group II
• Cage-raised, exposed to live hamsters--
went for back of neck, not throat
– Group III
• Cage-raised, exposed to live Prairie Dogs
– Group IV
• Outdoor raised, exposed to PDs
Survival of Released Foxes is
Affected by Method of Release
✔ Kit Foxes (in Ginsberg
1994)

Wild Caught, ✔ Wild caught

Hard-release translocated (hard
release) did best in
All Soft Releases short term
✔ Hard versus Soft
All Hard
Release were similar
Releases
after 2 years
Captive Reared, Hard-release
Sometimes Younger is Better!
(Valutis 1997)
✔ Post-release survival of
American Crows was better
Assume missing if we released them young
birds were alive – less dispersal
– gradual integration into wild
flocks may be better
– wild birds may be more
receptive to new birds during
Assume missing breeding season
birds were dead
References
✔ Vargas, A. 1994. Ontogeny of the endangered black-footed ferret (Mustela
nigripes) and effects of rearing conditions on predatory behavior and post-
release survival. PhD. Diss. U. Wyoming
✔ Ginsberg, JR. 1994. Captive breeding, reintroduction and the conservation of
canids. PP. 365-383. In. Olney et al. (eds.). Creative Conservation. Chapman
and Hall, London.
✔ Valutis, LL. 1997. Reintroduction of captive-reared birds. MSc. BSU. Boise, ID.
✔ Wild, MA. Et al. 1994. Comparing growth rates of dam- and hand-raised
Bighorn sheep, pronghorn, and elk neonates. J W M 58:340-347.
✔ Whitmore, KD and JM Marzluff. 1998. Hand-rearing corvids for reintroduction:
importance of feeding regime, nestling growth, and dominance. JWM 62:1460-
1479.
More References
✔ Wilson, AC and MR Stanley Price. 1994. Reintroduction as a reason for captive
breeding. PP 243-264. In. Olney et al. (eds.). Creative Conservation. Chapman and
Hall, London.
✔ Kleiman, DG et al. 1994. Criteria for reintroductions. PP 287-303. In. Olney et al.
(eds.). Creative Conservation. Chapman and Hall, London.
✔ Beck, B.B., et al. 1994. Reintroduction of captive-born animals. PP 265-286. In.
Olney et al. (eds.). Creative Conservation. Chapman and Hall, London.
✔ Griffith, B. Et al. 1989. Translocation as a species conservation tool: status and
strategy. Science 245:477-480.
✔ Cade, TJ et al. 1991. Efforts to restore the northern aplomado falcon by captive
breeding and reintroduction. Dodo 27:71-81.
✔ Williams, GR. 1977. Marooning--a technique for saving threatened species from
extinction. International Zoo Yearbook 17:102-106.
Yet More References
✔ Jones, CG. Et al. 1991. A summary of the conservation management of the
mauritius kestrel Falco punctatus 1973-1991. Dodo 27:81-99.
✔ Rachlow, JL. And J. Berger. 1997. Conservation implications of patterns
of horn regeneration in dehorned white rhinos. Conservation Biology
11:84-91.
✔ Berger, J. 1996. Animal behaviour and plundered mammals: Is the study
of mating systems a scientific luxury or a conservation necessity? Oikos
77:207-216.
✔ Wood, PB. And MW Collopy. 1993. Effects of egg removal on bald eagle
productivity in northern Florida. JWM 57:1-9.
✔ Marzluff, JM et al. 1994.Captive propagation and reintroduction of social
birds. Annual Report. Sustainable Ecosystems Institute, Meridian, ID.