Global News - August 2007

< Back to Global News

Diet supplement 'could save rare bird'

Tue 28 August 2007 12:35 UK — Australasia

Scientists from the University of Glasgow are working to save one of the most endangered species of bird in the world.

Researchers from the Scottish university are working with New Zealand's Department of Conservation to produce a dietary supplement which could boost egg production in the few remaining kakapo birds.

The kakapo is the largest of all parrot species and is flightless, nocturnal and plant-eating. It used to be found all over New Zealand but ecological changes, habitat clearance and the introduction of predatory mammals meant that only 51 survived in 1995.

In addition, kakapo breed infrequently. This is because the young are reared on the fruits of native trees - the pink pine and rimu - which only flower every two to six years.

Professor of zoology at Glasgow, David Houston, explained what his team were doing to save the creature: "Kakapo had been reluctant to breed, and when we analysed their food we suspected that it was their diet that was to blame.

"We experimentally fed kakapo a specially made supplement, with all the nutrients that we thought they were missing from their natural diet, to see if this would improve their breeding.

"Results showed that female birds that took the specially formulated food pellets laid significantly more eggs than those that did not. In 2002, the first year in which the new diet was trialled, they laid a total of 67 eggs."

Efforts to save the kakapo have been in place since the 1890s, but few conservation plans were successful until the Kakapo Recovery Plan was introduced in the 1980s.

< Back to Global News   |   Read IAR News

Read IAR News >