May 2/12 2012 Zero Extinction | p 2 The Edge of Extinction | p 14 WAZA Annual Report 2011 | insert – Zoo Vienna Zoo – Tigers at Tiergarten Schönbrunn. Jutta Kirchner © WAZA news 2/12 Gerald Dick Contents Editorial Zero Extinction ........................ 2 Dear WAZA members and friends! New Zealand’s Worst Maritime Ecological The 77th Anniversary Year of WAZA Disaster Ever ........................... 5 has started with a series of interesting My Career: Greg Geise ..............8 activities. The commemorative volume WAZA Interview: was very well received by our members Angela Glatston ..................... 12 and the book is also selling relatively The EDGE of Extinction .......... 14 well up to now. Please help to adver- Conservation of tise this interesting documentation of Freshwater Plants .................. 16 our international zoo and aquarium community, which is available for Book Reviews ........................ 18 just 14,99 £ (follow the link on the Announcements .................... 19 WAZA website). On the website you will also find details for the WAZA Animals@play at Annual conference in Melbourne and Johannesburg Zoo ..................21 the option to register as an early bird “Leap Here” till 31 May. Since early February WAZA at Singapore Zoo ....................22 is on facebook and interesting stories © WAZA Sumatra Tiger about animals, conservation and zoo Gerald Dick at Tierpark Berlin. GSMP meeting .......................23 activities let the number of friends grow Update: International constantly. Studbooks ............................ 24 Measuring WAZA was invited to take part in the held in Korea later in the year the plans Conservation Impact .............. 25 IUCN SSC Specialist Groups Chairs’ for the decade on biodiversity will be Taipei Frog Gaorong meeting and a special workshop ad- discussed with WAZA members of the Wildlife Refuge ...................... 26 dressing the relationship of ex situ South and South East Asian region. WAZA Projects and in situ as well as the cooperation This roundtable is also supported by the Sabah Rhino ...........................27 between IUCN specialist groups and IUCN SSC and IUCN Commission on Falémé Chimpanzees ............. 28 zoos and aquariums were addressed. Education and Communication. With UNITE for the Environment .... 29 As a result this issue of WAZA News the support of WAZA president and New Member Applications .......31 contains a contribution related to the his presence at such crucial interna- Obituary: Sue Mainka..............III ex situ and in situ component of con- tional meetings, the zoo and aquarium servation and another article is about community attracts further attention the potential role of zoos to conserve within the wider conservation com- threatened plant species – an outcome munity. of the IUCN gathering. At this year’s World Conservation Congress, to be Gerald Dick WAZA Executive Director Imprint Edition: 550 copies © WAZA 2012 Editor: Gerald Dick, WAZA Executive Office IUCN Conservation Centre This edition of WAZA News Rue Mauverney 28 is also available on CH-1196 Gland www.waza.org (members’ area). Switzerland phone: +41 22 999 07 90 Founding Member fax: +41 22 999 07 91 Printed on FSC paper. Layout and typesetting: [email protected] Print: Agentura NP, Staré Město, Czech Republic ISSN: 1662-7733 WAZA news 2/12 1 Jörg Junhold The President’s Page At the end of February 2012 the Species Survival Commission Spe- …in many cases cialist Group Chairs’ meeting took place in Abu Dhabi, generously being all parts of small funded and hosted by the Environ- ment Agency Abu Dhabi (EAD). SSC populations of chair Simon Stuart kindly invited me and our Executive Director Gerald endangered Dick to take part and contribute to the discussions and workshops from species should a zoo perspective. 300 participants engaged themselves and made this be intensively meeting a most beneficial experience. One focus was the improvement of managed as one © Zoo Leipzig in situ-ex situ links and a joint work- Jörg Junhold. shop was held on this topic. SSC’s meta population… Conservation Breeding Specialist Group (CBSG) uses the so called ‘One Plan Approach’ to point out that in I trust that all our members are many cases all parts of small popula- aware of the 77th anniversary that our tions of endangered species should organization is celebrating this year. be intensively managed as one meta Additionally, there is a second, im- population no matter whether they portant and related anniversary: the live in zoos or in the wild. This is Getting to know the work of WAZA’s German Association of Zoo Directors a huge field for future commitment Executive Office in Gland much better (VDZ) is becoming 125 years of age! of zoos and I can only encourage you during the last months I am always to follow this discussion and con- very impressed by what our staff is Through WAZA’s commemorative tribute to it. This approach will need achieving with small resources and volume you will know that the Ger- major attention if we really want to limited time frame. It is not only that man association is by far the oldest combine forces to save species from we are represented in many interna- one and German zoo directors were extinction. One part of this issue is tional contexts and ensure that our crucial in establishing international the re-introduction guidelines which voice is heard but we are as also com- cooperation across our profession. will be revised till the IUCN World municating with the public better and I had the honour to join the ceremony Conservation Congress in Jeju (Korea) better. One example is the up-to-date at the occasion of this 125th VDZ later this year in September. Another website which is being used by the anniversary in Berlin and it was my important point of the chair’s meet- public far more often than in former pleasure giving a welcome address on ing was the idea of a World Species times. I like to draw your attention es- behalf of WAZA. It is my belief that Congress in 2015. WAZA is intensively pecially to the fabulous ‘conservation we can benefit a lot from these com- working towards being one partner of resource centre’ that provides useful mon roots that we share. this conference together with IUCN. information and links to a variety of Although not all possible topics of other organizations and documents such a congress are fully explored yet dealing with zoo and conservation it would be an opportunity to gather issues. Please don’t miss the chance all representatives of in situ and ex to have a look at it! situ conservation for the first time in one meeting. Once again a great chance for our community to take on a leading role for the benefit of spe- cies survival. 2 WAZA news 2/12 John E. Fa – Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust/Imperial College London How to Save More Species: ‘Zero Tolerance’ Conservation for Zoos Zoos have indeed changed signifi- But, what if this paradigm for action Presently, and not only in zoos, cantly since their origins; important is too ambitious to achieve? After all, conservation programmes are often and valuable shifts in zoo policy have zoos have been advocating collabo- designed in isolation, not just of each occurred. Significantly, by participat- rating through breeding programmes other, but also of similar ones under- ing in endangered species conser- for the best part of 30 years, frankly taken by others (e.g. other regions); vation plans and environmental with only limited success. Given the a piecemeal approach that ignores education programmes, zoos support current biodiversity crisis, more of the the potential for making sure that the conservation of biodiversity. But, same may not make a difference to ‘snowballing’ effects can be achieved. there are still discrepancies between many species, IN TIME! How do we A system that can operate over zoos’ stated conservation goals and make zoos lead a ‘surge’ against bio- large scales by drawing on spatially their actual performance. diversity loss? Like any other organi- dispersed participants, e.g. across sation involved in conservation, zoos multiple conservation project sites To deliver clear measurable outputs should aim for the most favourable can result in an inter-communicated and outcomes in global biodiversity cost-to-benefit ratio, i.e. ‘the greatest system of project sites that together conservation zoos worldwide need to bang for your buck’. This means that can achieve cumulative change for establish an operational model that species cannot be seen in isolation of a multitude of species and land- allows them (jointly) to do this. Zoo- the ecological and human context in scapes. Is there already such a system logical gardens breed animals from which they live in and strategies that in place to which the global zoo com- threatened populations and can thus are practicable and more importantly munity can add and play a crucial role make a greater contribution towards that aim for cumulative or ‘snowball- in saving species from extinction? biodiversity conservation. The role of ing’ effects are crucial to instigate. zoos for species conservation must The term cumulative impacts have If, in a triage context, zoos are best not be underestimated. As recently normally been used in the context of placed at dealing with the ‘worst off’ reiterated by Delia Conde et al. in the culmination of many small-scale, species, i.e. those requiring immedi- their recent Science paper, while it is independent land-use decisions or ate interventions (including captive true ‘that the number of endangered activities into a major outcome. Typi- breeding), then taxa that are both species and individual animals at any cally, cumulative impacts arise from highly threatened and restricted to one zoo is small, if several institutions uncoordinated decisions, so the out- single locations should be of primary link up, zoological gardens will have comes are neither intended nor pre- conservation interest.