Nestlings for threatened Asian vultures
One of world's most threatened birds - Asian vultures - breeds in captivity for first time
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Thursday, 06, Aug 2009 12:07
One of the world's most threatened birds has been successfully bred in captivity for the first time.
It is hoped this captive breeding could potentially save the slender-billed vulture, and other critically endangered Asian vultures, from extinction.
Two of the vultures have been reared at centres in India, along with three Oriental white-backed vultures.
The slender-billed, which is rarer in India than the tiger, has a dramatically decreasing population, with only 1,000 still in the wild.
The vultures' decline has been driven by the veterinary drug Diclofenac. The birds die of kidney failure after eating the carcasses of livestock that have died within a few days of treatment with the drug.
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds' (RSPB) Chris Bowden is in charge of the society's Asian vulture programme. He said: "This news is a huge boost to those of us fighting to save Asian vultures, which face extinction in the wild within the next decade unless we can prevent the veterinary use of Diclofenac, which causes acute kidney failure in vultures consuming the carcasses of treated livestock."
Last year saw the first successful captive breeding of Oriental white-backed vultures and there are encouraging signs a third critically endangered species, the long-billed vulture, may breed in the centres next year.
The Oriental white-backed vulture is dropping in population by more than 40 per cent a year in India- one of the fastest recorded rates of decline for any species. The numbers of long-billed and slender-billed vultures together, have fallen by almost 97 per cent since 1992.
Dr Vibhu Prakash, head of the Bombay Natural History Society's (BNHS) Vulture Breeding Programme, said: "As many more of the young birds reach maturity over the next two years, we confidently anticipate that breeding will really take off."
In Nepal, an additional initiative led by the National Trust for Nature Conservation, Bird Conservation Nepal and the department of national parks & wildlife conservation, with support from the Zoological Society of London and RSPB, has successfully collected 44 young Oriental white-backed vultures ready to breed in future.
Government efforts both in India and Nepal to ban veterinary formulations are taking effect, but further measures are needed to stop illegal use of human formulations in treating livestock, says the RSPB.