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MORE GREAT ASSISTED REPRODUCTION NEWS FROM AL WABRA, QATAR! / Weitere großartige Neuigkeiten der assistierten Reproduktion der Spixaras in ALWABRA Wildlife Preservation, Qatar (deutsche Version unten)
With the new Rio 2 movie, Spix’s macaws were in the air again and with that came the public’s cry for updated news on the captive management and breeding of the species and where we stand with potential release into the wild.
After much effort in the 2012, 2013 and 2014 breeding seasons preparing and implementing strategies that could increase the possibility of fertile eggs leading to a faster growth in the population and more importantly using assisted reproduction techniques to ensure genetic representation
The 2013 breeding season with the expert help of the reproductive specialists at Parrot Reproduction Consulting (PRC) had the first ever Spix’s macaws produced using artificial insemination (AI) right here at Al Wabra Wildlife
Other important factors that needed addressing in the Spix’s macaw population was the lack of parent reared chicks, as well as the use of other techniques to ensure better conspecific teaching of juvenile birds as they mature to adulthood.
Our hand rearing techniques are designed to impart as little human interaction to the birds as possible. Then flocking of each year’s offspring once hand reared, with previous offspring in massive flocking aviaries. These techniques have been used on the young Spix’s at AWWP for a good few years now and the results seem to be showing. The birds learn from each other with little human contact and have the opportunity to pick their own mates if genetics allows. This we believe is the best start to life we can give to hand reared birds to create the best future breeding pairs possible that potentially rear their own chicks.
Nearly all existing Spix’s Macaws are hand raised and they have never had the chance to raise their own chicks. This results from many factors, but mostly due to infertile clutches and the need to ensure the safety of each very important chick. In both the 2012 and 2013 breeding seasons fertile eggs from other species were placed under numerous breeding Spix’s to give them the opportunity to parent rear, with multiple opportunities there were improvements, but unfortunately no success.
In the 2014 breeding season however, two young pairs that were raised as described above, produced their first clutches at a record young age for the Spix’s macaws in captivity. It was decided to give one of the pairs the opportunity to raise a macaw chick from another species: Illiger macaw (Primolius maracana). After the first clutch of non-developing eggs, the team at AWWP gave them a fertile illiger macaw egg, the female was left to incubate the second infertile clutch with the placed fertile egg. The pair was closely observed, watching for incubation techniques, aggression, assisting the chick during hatching and their raising techniques. To our delight, the young Spix’s pair was calm and raised their chick well, the only negative was that the chick was over preened and plucked around the rump, all the important long feathers were intact and the plucked feathers are growing back nicely. Now that they are proven “parents”, it is planned to allow them to raise Spix’s macaw chicks in the next breeding seasons.
The teams of AWWP and PARROT REPRODUCTION CONSULTING are working closely together in the breeding of the Spix’s macaws. This breeding season (2014), another 2 Spix’s chicks resulted from AI. Together with another two fertile eggs which unfortunately didn’t hatch, thus the result of egg fertilization from last year was doubled. If further eggs have been fertile but not showing macroscopic development they will be investigated by the director of AWWP and blue macaw captive coordinator Dr. Cromwell Purchase using a special egg analysis technique including the analysis of the germinal disc of visually non-developing eggs, this information helps on so many levels and is key to achieving greater successes in the future.
The 2014 breeding season gave a lot more scientific knowledge to the scientists and veterinarians from AWWP and PARROT REPRODUCTION CONSULTING. This will help to optimize the techniques and the strategies constantly. One of the biggest breakthrough’s in the 2014 breeding season was the successful pairing of female Spix’s macaws, where both females bonded and laid in the same nest with the absence of a male. This was further enhanced by the successful fertilization of 2 eggs using AI and the successful hatching of one of those eggs adding to the Spix’s macaw population. The reason why this breakthrough is so important is due to the demographics of the population, where there is a skewed sex bias with excess females that up to now have been lost to the population unpaired. We were able to fertilize an egg of both females in the pair. Due to these females not having contact with males for years, the successful artificial insemination is guaranteed. Additionally this result demonstrate that surplus females no longer need to be lost for breeding in threatened captive bird populations.
Beside the 2 Chicks from AI, 3 young Spix’s macaws out of natural pairings hatched at AWWP in 2014. Again we were fortunate to have more males than females produced, with 3 males and 2 females for the season; this is very important due to the large female sex bias in the population. At the same time during the artificial insemination work, one pair of short billed black cockatoos started nesting. This pair has historically never produced fertile eggs due to human imprinting. After artificial insemination, 2 chicks out of 2 eggs a 100% success rate was achieved. Both chicks are developing well.
AWWP and PARROT REPRODUCTION CONSULTING have gained a lot of new data and knowledge about Spix reproduction biology and their breeding behavior. Both teams are looking forward to the next breeding season, to continue our efforts to save this incredible species.
AWWP, Parrot Reproduction Consulting
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