Anas cyanoptera tropicus, Critically endangered

One of the less than 15 individuals in captivity in the world. It is considered Endangered in some books and in others it is Critically, the latest one said critically so i´ll go with that one. This is a male.
The Zoo houses 3 individuals, 1 male and 2 apparent females, although they all look young so not sure yet.

Anas cyanoptera tropicus

Either immature or eclipse drake.

The smallest of the 5 Cinnamon teals, didn't know it was kept in captivity at all ! Hopefully a breeding-programm like that of the Hawaii goose can be started and will be as succesfull as that one to save the subspecies. With a load of waterfowl-breeders in the western world I assume such a programm would make a real chance to succeed !
Please keep us informed about the results with the 3 birds at Cali Zoo and thank you for this picture toto98 !

Apparently there is another group of about 6-8 individuals that is held at the Aviario Nacional de Colombia, it would be great if a programme between both intitutions can be done. I will confirm the sexes of the individuals soon, and will also confirm the existance of the other group as soon as I know anything.

ps. I will also post some pictures of this beutiful species in the wild. In fact I could say I "own" their habitat, as they breed in my family farm, so I go to check them out weekly

That's realy amazing, a ( critically ) endangered subspecies in your own 'backyard'. I'm pretty sure you know what do do and protect this habitat as good as you can ! Hope you will succeed in this.

If it was jus my place i would have destroyed the crops and flood everything for them, unfortunately thats impossible. The actual problem is that the introduced bullfrogs eat the ducklings and in the past 3-4 years that we have been visiting them we have only seen about 10 duckling. (very few, as we may see up to 20 breeding pairs)

Anas cyanoptera.....

There is a case here for picking up the eggs and hand rearing for release at the pre-flight stage. This may involve permits to do so, but could save the population, until the bullfrogs can be dealt with.

I was thinking exactly the same FBBird but also don't know if permits are needed for this. Also it is possible the keep a few of the hand-reared birds for the captive breeding population ( if allowed )

That would be ideal, but we would have to investigate how much of that is actually legal.
here is the link to one of the pictures i´ve taken of the teals in the wild.
http://www.zoochat.com/924/wild-anas-cynoptera-tropicus-critically-endangered-345450/

Some new news about the teals;
- the zoo´s animals are 2 males and 1 female
- the aviario nacional birds are 5 males and 3 females

Regarding a conservation project, the Cali zoo is discussing the possibility of acquring more individuals to be able to create a captive breeding population, so hopefully everything will turn out good.