Kawekaweau
Well-Known Member
Brown teal are indeed kept by licensed keepers as part of the breeding/recovery program. Was just wondering whether any of the legally huntable shelducks or ducks were kept privately as well.
Birds In New Zealand Zoos
- Thread starter Chlidonias
- Start date
Why were they shot?
the same reason lots of protected birds get shot. They were there and some idiot had a gun.
Kawekaweau
Well-Known Member
Would the green peafowl, Nicobar pigeon and rhea have been "zoo-only" animals as in only zoo-licensed facilities could own them? Sad that the magpie geese died out.
all of those species were only in zoos, but that's only because it was the zoos who imported them. If they hadn't died out then there wouldn't be any reason that the peafowl and pigeon at least wouldn't be available to private aviculturists (in fact the peafowl probably were kept privately as well). The reason they died out was simply due to only a few birds having been originally brought in, and not much breeding going on.
The trick with numerically small importations is to breed many individuals, really quickly. This minimises genetic loss: a large, slightly inbred population is better than an extinct one. For example, all the Brown Eared Pheasants in the west, for many decades, descended from an original importation of three birds. Breeding results eventually deteriorated, and towards the end of the 20th century, new blood from China became available. It is likely that the three species mentioned above, could have been maintained in New Zealand if enough had been bred initially, and distributed to public and private collections.
Kawekaweau
Well-Known Member
Would you need a license to keep kookaburras or magpies?
no, not to my knowledge.
Not many people keep kookaburras, but there are loads of pet magpies. There are some local rules regarding those however (e.g. it is illegal to own, transfer to, etc, magpies to Stewart Island).
I have been playing around with the bird list in the original post of the thread, and made a big rearrangement. I'm not sure if it makes it more useful or less useful. It's certainly made it much longer.
Previously I had included all the more recent "extinctions" of exotics in NZ zoos (and the "general possibilities" for natives which might appear) amongst the species which are still present (marking them within brackets), but I decided to move them all to the bottom of the list in one place. It was a little complicated because there are a lot of native species which are probably about as rehab animals and so it's not clear-cut as to whether they should be left as "current" or moved to "former". So I made a vague rule that if there are any individuals of native species known to be on permanent display then that species would stay in "current" but all others just go to "former". But I left all the exotic parrots and waxbills in place in the "current" list because they were too complicated.
Then I decided to not have a cut-off date for "extinctions" like I had done for mammals (where it was 1980). And then it got a little out of hand. Never mind.
The result is a long list of "current" birds, and then a long list of random "extinct" exotics and "maybe will turn up" natives. It's a bit clumsy.
Maybe I should entirely separate exotics from natives. Have them as two lists rather than combined.
Previously I had included all the more recent "extinctions" of exotics in NZ zoos (and the "general possibilities" for natives which might appear) amongst the species which are still present (marking them within brackets), but I decided to move them all to the bottom of the list in one place. It was a little complicated because there are a lot of native species which are probably about as rehab animals and so it's not clear-cut as to whether they should be left as "current" or moved to "former". So I made a vague rule that if there are any individuals of native species known to be on permanent display then that species would stay in "current" but all others just go to "former". But I left all the exotic parrots and waxbills in place in the "current" list because they were too complicated.
Then I decided to not have a cut-off date for "extinctions" like I had done for mammals (where it was 1980). And then it got a little out of hand. Never mind.
The result is a long list of "current" birds, and then a long list of random "extinct" exotics and "maybe will turn up" natives. It's a bit clumsy.
Maybe I should entirely separate exotics from natives. Have them as two lists rather than combined.
zooboy28
Well-Known Member
I think that might be a good idea. It gets a little confusing trying to read through it all, but its such a great resource with so much information (especially the "extinct" section).
any suggestions on how to break it up? There are already six sticky threads at the top of the NZ forum for the various lists, so if I break it into "native birds" and "exotic birds" it will add yet another thread there. Maybe that wouldn't matter. Or I could do it as "current" and "former" lists as with mammals, but that would be much more messy I think because with mammals we don't need to worry about natives coming in as rescues.
Or I could still have them in the single post on this thread, but put the natives first (combining all the current and possibles), then current exotics, then "extinct" exotics. That will only be as long as it is right now, but seems just as confusing.
Or basically have what I've got now, but only put exotics in the "extinct" section because those species will never be replaced, and put all the natives in the first section. That would make the "extinct" section shorter, and allow more comparisons between natives in the "current" section.
However I do it is going to be awkward I think.
zooboy28
Well-Known Member
I think having the native birds as one block, then exotics split as current and former, would make most sense (I don't think the thread should be split). People interested in natives (for example, someone planning a trip to NZ and wanting to know whether they can see a certain species or not), can more easily check all the natives, while someone interested in exotics can easily see those species. That's my perspective anyway.
I've modified it to this.
So the only natives in the "former" ("extinct") section are a few subantarctic species which won't be re-appearing (i.e. a few penguins, Reischek's and Forbes' parakeets, Auckland Island duck, and Auckland Island rail).
I think it works better now.
(Posting at the same time as you were posting...)
there's a tricky bit involved where there are species like King and Gentoo Penguins where the species itself is native, but the stock is imported. Or Nankeen Night Heron where the former stock was imported, but they are now also a self-introduced species so individuals could appear in zoos as rescue birds, and similarly the Barn Owls in captivity now are natives but the former stock was imported.
The division between exotic and native is much less sharp than in the mammals or reptiles.
zooboy28
Well-Known Member
Yeah, this is a good point, and that does complicate things. I guess you could have duplicate entries for each of those in the native and exotic lists?
yeah, I considered that as well. I thought that might make things more confusing though?
zooboy28
Well-Known Member
Not necessarily. For barn owl, night heron (and maybe pelican?), you can have a listing in natives that says the current situation, with a note saying "previously stock was imported, but this has died out, see listing in extinct exotic section for further details". Its definitely more confusing for the penguins, as the exotic stock is still present, but I think a similar thing can be done - and given Subantarctic species have already been removed, I think the King and Gentoo penguins can just be shifted to exotics and left there.
I'll move some stuff around and see how it turns out. Looking at the list it should actually work fine, although I'll move the subantarctic species back amongst the natives (just bracketed as being "former"), that way all the "extinct" species can be exotic.
I've done exactly that now - natives followed by exotics followed by former exotics. I like it much better than what I had before.
um, I'm really regretting the idea I had of not having a cut-off date for "former" species. I think I'm going to have to restrict it to 1980 like I did with the mammals.
I just started looking through newspaper archives. Putting "auckland zoo birds" into the search terms on one site gave me over 2000 articles. Obviously there's lots of general articles just saying "tropical birds imported" or with non-specific names like "toucans" or "birds of paradise", but the number of idenitifiable species is going to end up being in the hundreds. And those just for Auckland Zoo!
I just started looking through newspaper archives. Putting "auckland zoo birds" into the search terms on one site gave me over 2000 articles. Obviously there's lots of general articles just saying "tropical birds imported" or with non-specific names like "toucans" or "birds of paradise", but the number of idenitifiable species is going to end up being in the hundreds. And those just for Auckland Zoo!