Biodiversity (1988) / Chapter Skim
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Part 7: Science and Technology: How Can They Help?
Part 7: Science and Technology: How Can They Help?
Pages 261-308
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From page 262... ...
`~.(..,'t'j'.~w' (''.~.^'ttO~i t~j (,)
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From page 263... ...
Third, although the majority of wild species must persist outside of wildlife preserves, large land vertebrates and great aggregations that conflict with humans will be mostly confined to refuges and those outside will require continual monitoring, protection, and help. Finally, human populations will continue to grow for some time, inexorably reducing resources available to other species, while human land-use patterns, cultural attitudes, and economic practices will continue to shift and change (Myers, 19791.
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From page 264... ...
Each Technique Has Been Utilized with the Species Listed Below It on a Long-Term or Experimental Basis Intervention Technique Species Short-term propagation and reintroduction Long-term propagation Relocation, transplantation Fostering, cross-fostering Artificial incubation Artificial rearing Artificial insemination Embryo transfer Golden lion tamarin, cheetah, wolf, red wolf, American and European bison, Arabian oryx, onager, Andean condor, bald eagle, peregrine, Hawaiian goose, Lord Howe Island wood rail, Guam rail, European eagle owl, Guam kingfisher, Galapagos giant tortoise, Galapagos land iguana, Ash Meadows Amargosa pupfish Lion-tailed macaque, Siberian tiger, Pere David's deer, European bison, Przewalski horse, brown-eared pheasant, Edward's pheasant, Bali myna, white-raped crane, addax, slender-horned gazelle, scimitar-horned oryx, gaur, Gerevy's zebra, Puerto Rican horned toad, Chinese alligator, Mauritius pink pigeon, Madagascar radiated tortoise, Aruba Island rattlesnake Koala, mongoose femur, aye-aye, brown femur, chimpanzee, gorilla, squirrel monkey, wooly monkey, spider monkey, common marmoset, black rhinoceros, white rhinoceros, red deer, white-tailed deer, mule deer, moose, Tule elk, bighorn sheep, musk-ox, pronghorn antelope, roan antelope, mountain goat, African elephant, more than 400 species of birds, many reptiles and amphibians Peregrine, bald eagle, whooping crane, masked quail, polar bear (captive) , many species of waterfowl, pigeons, cranes (in nature and captivity)
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From page 265... ...
" Most losses of biological diversity, to say nothing of lost ecological services, are quite beyond human ability to repair. Too many very intricately interdependent species are being lost too rapidly with too many unpredictable consequences for others.
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From page 266... ...
A founlation for such help rests in growing international collaboration and, in the United States, in unequallec3 programs of coordinated animal data gathering in the International Species Inventory System and species management in the Species Survival Plan of the American Association of Zoological Parks and Aquariums. Zoos are breeding orangutans and Chinese alligators, Bali mynas, pink pigeons, and Puerto Rican horned frogs, adclax, slender-homed gazelles, wattled cranes, and black femurs.
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From page 267... ...
The apparently simple techniques of artificial insemination, for example, have been successful with scarcely 20 wild species of mammals. Nonetheless, development of the scientific understanding necessary to long-term propagation is a technological fulcrum for many intensive species care programs.
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From page 268... ...
1986. be pract~1 d~culdes and Anancia1 implications unendangered species brewing pa Int.
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From page 269... ...
Higher plants, being sedentary, are often highly site-specific. This facilitates the development of logical plans for demarcating minimal areas for in situ conservation based on ecological knowledge and principles of island biogeography.
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From page 270... ...
In short, they are welcomed adornments to the human environment. Is is certainly true, then, that the rapidly increasing demand for ex situ conservation, occasioned by the inexorable destruction of natural habitats, presents botanical gardens with both a challenge and an opportunity, the likes of which have not arisen for more than a century.
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From page 271... ...
This explains why crop plants, particularly long-lived tropical species such as Hevea rubber, have flourished best in plantations outside their region of origin. Clearly, this biological reality causes political prob' lems, which must be faced and overcome if ex situ conservation is to succeed and its subjects are to be exploited to benefit humans.
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From page 272... ...
The genetic material thus conserved can be introduced to other extant genotypes, but whole individuals cannot be regenerated independently. Although gene libraries are subject to the same problems of population genetics as other methods of ex situ conservation, at present they can more easily be stored indefinitely.
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From page 273... ...
Fumished as a rule with a reference herbarium and a library as well as living plant material, they alone have the breadth of facilities required for the research needed to back up and refine the management of conserved plant populations in the wild. THE GENETIC CONSEQUENCES OF EX SITU CONSERVATION Although for practical reasons, including nomenclatural custom, we fall into the habit of giving priority to species conservation, the genetic nature of the biological species remains elusive for many kinds of organisms, including bacteria and other microorganisms and a large percentage of plant groups.
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From page 274... ...
This has been recognized by forest geneticists whose ex situ conservation programs for "provenances" represent just this (Zobel, 1978~. Among crop plants, unique genes and gene combinations, which may be as important to the survival of endangered species as to the protection of domestic crops, can presently be recovered if lost from a culture only by resorting to wild populations.
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From page 275... ...
Could not most endangered species be conserved in situ more cheaply by careful planning and management? How is the cost of in situ conservation to be estimated The record to date for ex situ culture does not give grounds for optimism.
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From page 276... ...
There certainly will be a rapid increase in research on, and public understanding and support of, rare and endangered species once population samples are conserved ex situ in botanical gardens that have active programs of education and research. The basic data on methods of seed storage can be best accumulated where there is ready access to captive populations.
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From page 277... ...
The aim of the research is always to improve the techniques for managing wild populations in situ. Again, ex situ conservation is an ancillary to in situ conservation, not an alternative.
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From page 278... ...
1981. Research in botanical gardens.
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From page 279... ...
embryo transplants. O ~ ~ - - -1- -- - 0 - ~ -I- - r - - -- - -- I - - ~ - - - -I - -- I artificial insemination, and other sophisticated clinical procedures.
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From page 280... ...
and the Mauritius kestrel (Falco punctatus) , are among the most endangered species in the world, and all seem to have attracted increasing human interest in recent years.
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From page 281... ...
One of the chief bottlenecks hindering the mass production of raptors in captivity has been the frequent failure to achieve fertilization of eggs because of incompat' ibilities between mates. Thus, breeders must often resort to artificial insemination of egg-laying females.
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From page 282... ...
The most widely distribute(l, naturally occurring avian species in the world, the peregrine suffered drastic reductions in numbers in both Europe and North America in the 1950s and 1960s, primarily because of the effects of organochlorine pesticides such as DDT and dieldrin. Since then there have been major international efforts to restore this species, in part by restricting the use of persistent organochlorine pesticides and by captive breeding and reintroduction.
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From page 283... ...
The complete restoration of the peregrine falcon in North America is now a predictable result of continuing to apply the technology developed for its recovery. CAPTIVE BREEDING IN WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT The rearing of captive animals and their use for restocking and reintroduction have not been favored techniques of modern wildlife management.
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From page 284... ...
States. Hundreds of thousands of these birds were released more than 350,000 from 1956 through 1958 alone but no breeding populations ever became established (Long, 1981~.
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From page 285... ...
Fish ant! Wildlife Service, the federal agency that administers the Endangered Species Act, is nominally in charge of the program, The Peregrine Fund has also worked closely with the U.S.
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From page 286... ...
This new trend to rely more on technologies such as captive breeding and reintroduction for the restoration of species has become necessary because we human beings have not paid heed to the ecological imperative to preserve nature. We have not followed the philosophy of Leopold and others like him to keep the land and waters as fit habitats for wild animals and plants.
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From page 287... ...
Consider the $10 million one person was willing to pay for an untrained race horse, and single purses of $15 million win or losefor a world championship heavyweight prize fight, or the billions of private dollars being spent to support cocaine and heroin addictions. When one takes account of the trillions of dollars human beings are willing to spend on foolish or trivial things, the cost of saving endangered species and endangered habitats pales to insignif' icance.
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From page 288... ...
1983. Falcon propagation, a manual on captive breeding.
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From page 289... ...
technology in captive breeding programs for endangered species. Instead, reflection upon recent activities suggested a focus on information, software, decision analysis, and social psychology.
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From page 290... ...
, if it is to be viable and if it is to retain about 80 to 90% of its genetic diversity for 100 to 200 years (Franker and Soule, 1981; Rails and Ballou, 1986~. These numbers suggest that if all institutional spaces for mammals and birds were used for Species Survival Plan (SSP)
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From page 291... ...
These devices are also planned for use in several carnivore release programs to allow elective recapture of dispersing animals. REPRODUCTION Discussions of the possible contribution of ex situ captive breeding programs to conservation refer hopefully to the near future of 100 to 200 years by which time methods of reproductive enhancement and long~term gamete or embryo storage
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From page 292... ...
These methods have haci a significant impact on the captive management of three species in particular: orangutans, with the establishment of separate subspecies from Borneo and Sumatra by karyotype and two serum proteins; Asiatic lions, with the electrophoretic demonstration of African lion founders in the lineage of nearly all the captive population; and tigers, with the molecular evidence failing to support the traditional separation into separate subspecies. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY Digital technology is the foundation of our new age of information.
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From page 293... ...
The International Species Inventory System (ISIS) provides a continuously updated, centralized data base of census, demographic, pedigree, and laboratory data on wild animals kept in zoos.
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From page 294... ...
The European Species Survival Plan coordinators are also required to enter their species data into ISIS. IN SITU AND EX SITU METHODS Conservation of species is clearly best served by in situ methods based on biological community and habitat.
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From page 295... ...
1986. Genetic management of captive populations.
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From page 296... ...
The greatest threat to the preservation of genetic diversity of wild animals comes from the destruction and clegradation of their habitats (Croner, 1984~. Some experts are estimating that if today's pace of habitat destruction continues, 1 million species of plants and animals may become extinct by the end of this century (AAZPA, 1983~.
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From page 297... ...
Fueled by the groundwork laid by the agricultural industry, zoo researchers have begun to study the reproductive processes of wild animals and to use technology such as embryo transfer ant! artificial insemination to help improve the reproductive po' tential of wild animals.
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From page 298... ...
Scientists have realized that the development of advanced reproductive technology, such as embryo transfer, gamete cryopreservation, and artificial insemination, may represent the real key to the future for many species who are currently threatened by extinction. They have also realized that this technology will do a great deal to improve and maintain the genetic diversity within captive populations.
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From page 299... ...
(Hearn and Summers, 19861. 1984 First successful nonsurgical interspecies embryo transfer between two different species of wild animals bongo (Tragelaphus euryceros)
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From page 300... ...
In addition, it is a goal of many zoo researchers to develop interspecies embryo transfers to the point at which embryos can be collected from endangered species and transferred to surrogates of a more common species, thereby greatly increasing the reproductive potential of the donor species. Other important benefits result from embryo transfer.
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From page 301... ...
have important consequences for the transplant of both domestic and wild species from one location to another. Interspecies embryo transfer has enjoyed limited success in wild animals, but much more research needs to be done in this area.
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From page 302... ...
Offspring contain only genetic material of the original species. Many people now recognize that the method of chimera production might be utilized to rescue endangered species.
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From page 303... ...
Artificial insemination has had limited success in wild animals thus far, especially with certain species of mammals and birds. Success has been attained for the following species: Nondomes tic Mammals Addaxi Brown bracket deer Ferret Rhesus monkey Guanaco Reindeer Foxy Baboon Llama Red deer Wolff Squirrel monkey Blackbucki Speke s gazelle Persian leopard Chimpanzeei Bighorn sheep Giant panda)
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From page 304... ...
The first successful artificial insemination of a wild species with previously frozen semen occurred in 1973 with the wolf (Seager, 1981~. This was followed by the successful insemination of a gorilla (Douglass and Gould, 1981~.
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From page 305... ...
A large amount of basic research is urgently needed before application ot new technology will be routine for maintaining captive populations. It is hoped that the urgency will be recognized by many more scientists worldwide than at present, and that ex situ conservation programs will become the nuclei of genetic material for dwindling populations of wild animals.
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From page 306... ...
1982. Successful artificial insemination and embryo collection in the African lion (Panthera leg)
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From page 307... ...
1981. Induction of oestrus and successful artificial insemination in the cougar, Fells concolor.
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From page 308... ...
1981. Superovulation and artificial insemination of Bengal tigers (Panthera signs)
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