Captive breeding essential for Europe's Egyptian vultures

DesertRhino150

DesertRhino150

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15+ year member
A new study released by the RSPB has deemed the captive breeding of the Egyptian vulture essential if Europe's dwindling populations are to be saved.

Releases of captive-bred birds would delay its extirpation from parts of its range, buying conservationists more time to remove threats along the migratory flyway. The research showed that if there was no improvement in survival and human-induced mortality continued along the flyway, releasing even up to fifteen birds per year would not be sufficient to safeguard the Balkan breeding population.

However, projected extinction risk over a thirty year period was considerably lower than if no population reinforcement was taking place (a 49% chance of extinction without reinforcement, <1% chance of extinction if 12 or more birds are released every year for 30 years). That time could then be used to increase survival of birds in the wild by about 6%, which would be enough for the population to become self-sufficient.

The abstract of the paper is included here:
https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1365-2664.13958

An article about the study is included here:
Captive breeding 'essential' to save Egyptian Vulture - BirdGuides
 
For the first time, a captive-bred Egyptian vulture has successfully fledged young in the wild.

The female vulture was hatched at the Centro Rapaci Minacciati Endangered Raptors Centre in Italy in 2015 as part of efforts to increase the species' population in the country. She was released in Puglia in August 2015 and spent her first four years of life in sub-Saharan Africa. Since then, she has returned to southern Italy each spring and wintered in Niger.

On 22nd March 2022, she was found in Sicily in the company of a wild male and showing clear breeding behaviour. She then moved to a new site on the island, possibly after being driven away by an established pair. Because reducing disturbance was a priority, it was not until August that it was confirmed that two young had been hatched. They fledged a couple of days after they were first seen.

This shows that effective captive breeding and release programmes could help bolster wild populations of endangered vultures.

A full article about the success can be found here:
Captive-bred Egyptian Vulture successfully fledges young for the first time - BirdGuides
 
Interestingly, Lesser Spotted Eagle population in Germany was ca 25 years ago also decreasing because of killing on its migration route.

Modelling was done, showing that the LSE population in Germany is bound to fall and go extinct. The black point was identified to be the Middle East, in particular a single valley in Lebanon which is the migration bottleneck of migrating raptors. The proposal was taking one chick from wild nests, raising in captivity and returning to the nest before fledging (in LSE, older chick almost always kills its sibling). I wonder what was actually done in the following years?
 
Germans started to take the second chcik out of Lesser Spotted Eagle nests in Germany and Lithuania, hand-rear them and release them (without returning them to any wild nest).

Unfortunately, 50% of these young birds die during their first migration, they dont find proper route though Turkey but instead try to cross sea around Italy or so and die by exhaustion over water.

Here is info but in German
 
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