EAZA, 2009 year of the European carnivore

[kiang]

2008 was the year of the amphibian in European zoos, which saw a lot of collections building new faciliites for amphibians and bringing in new species to their collections.
Now 2009 will be the year of the European carnivore, focusing on the "not so dirt dozen", which are,

polar bear
European wolves (6 subspecies)
European lynx (5-11 subspecies recognised)
marbled polecat
European otter
Iberian lynx
brown bear
Arctic fox
jackal
European mink
European wildcat
wolverine

As with the amphibians it will be interesting which collections will take in any of the above mentioned species as part of the project.

Here is a link to the website with all the projects which will be funded by the events held all over Europe during the year.

EAZA European Carnivore Campaign 2008/9: Living together

 

[okapikpr]

Its good to see an emphasis on native wildlife...I wonder if the AZA will continue their yearly taxa emphasis next year?

 

[Kifaru Bwana]

Several programmes have been running in Europe that deal with native species conservation. Habitat guidelines, Natura 2000 et al that are all administered pan-European. The emphasis of these programmes has been on creating corridors and linking different sub-populations and the long-term goal is ensuring healthy genetically diverse populations of all (endangered) taxa.

The EAZA European Carnivore campaign is another programme that will deal with ensuring robust conservation measures of Europe's carnivore taxa. EAZA is to be congratulated on initiating a conservation campaign for taxa that traditionally get overlooked or unjustly suffer a bad press.

 

[okapikpr]

What are the corridors that are being created in Europe...is there any one organization supporting this cause. In North America there is such an organization called the Wildlands Project.

 

[forumbully]

Boosting this topic a bit.
(and shamelessly advertising my own site, but I hope in this case, it's ok)

ZooSite, the association of dutch speaking zoosite, is organising several events to raise money for the European carnivore campaign.

Our main event will be the "Carnivore Car Chase"
a sponsor race in which we intend to visit all european carnivores kept in dutch zoos and this in 1 day.

date: july 5th
n° of participants: 4, the entire zoosite-team, driving in 1 car
n° of zoos: 7 (and several with quite some distance between, to be honest)
n° of animals: 22 in 9 species

we'll be running on a very tight schedule:
Tijdsschema Carnivore Car Chase | Zoosite

All sponsors are welcome and can donate
- per zoo visited
- per animal seen
(you can always give a maximum amount if you desire)

if you'd like to sponsor:
Carnivore Car Chase sponsorformulier
As our site is dutch, so is the form, but I think it's pretty transparent. if not, let me know and I'll be happy to translate.