wild kangaroos in France

09-10-2007

brazilian agouti - theres a few pairs pairs and groups around the place and some zoos are breeding them better than others. melbourne has a long history with this species but until recently was down to one! it appears as if we are pushing on trying to maintain them despite the high liklihood that this species is highly inbred.

patagonian cavy (mara) - pretty much dying out from inbreeding. melbourne recently sent theirs to be consolodated into one group at adelaide but i think there may be just one male. likely they'll be gone in a few years time.

09-10-2007

There's around 20 left, although as you say Pat, spread across six institutions. There's talk of trying to get more, but the import of rodents is a big issue - particularly fast little ones that escape well, and would survive pretty well anywhere in Australia if they got out of captivity. Naturally, that makes them a tough one to import.

Yep, there's now a male and six females at Adelaide, and a male and four females at Dubbo. Auckland has two lone females.

A number of zoos are keen to hold them, but then there's the same old problem - import of rodents is not an easy thing.

09-10-2007

Surely both could be part of the South American area at Taronga when it's developed. The likelihood of escape is pretty small in a government zoo - when was the last escape?

09-10-2007

I didn't say that agoutis had escpaed, but the risk potential of them surviving and breeding in the wild is pretty high.

And surely you don't think animals never escape from government zoos??? You could write a book about some of them, but clearly, since none of them are cropping up on the thread dedicated to escapes, they obviously aren't well know outside of the zoos!

And no, I'm not going to spill the beans

09-10-2007

Of course I don't think that animals never escape from government zoos - several examples spring to mind (including the famous storm in which Mary the gibbon at Taronga availed herself of a convenient "bridge" [her fig tree] and couldn't be found for several days). However, with the notable exception of the squirrels at Taronga and Perth that were released many, many years ago, I don't think there have been any examples of escaped animals establishing themselves in Australia?

10-10-2007

i can imagine agouti doing quite well in the more tropical parts of australia where there are non-eucalyptus dominated forests. but much of the wilder parts of australia is a relatively harsh habitat for species that are accustomed to eating ficus trees fruits and nuts. of course i'm sure the little buggers would do just fine in north queensland.

in barzil i saw them in both teh amazon rainforest and in thickets in the pantanals dry grass savannahs. the pantanal species appeared grey, in contrast with what i am pretty sure where regular brazilian agouti in the amazon. they may have been a different species but in any effect they are probably quite adaptable.

that said i can imagine coati could cause a lot of damage if released. or otters or tree shrews or any of the hundreds of exotic reptiles we have in the country.

10-10-2007

Very true. I'm just wondering why it's used as a reason not to import when it's true of all species - including some of the larger ones, like big cats or indeed wild dogs, that are imported despite these risks.