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From: rim@csadfa.cs.adfa.oz.au (Bob McKay)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: Importing parrots for genetic variability
Message-ID: <1991Jun17.024522.12693@sserve.cc.adfa.oz.au>
Date: 17 Jun 91 02:45:22 GMT
References: <28577E6E.68B8@intercon.com>
Sender: news@sserve.cc.adfa.oz.au
Organization: Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, Australia
Lines: 37

From article <28577E6E.68B8@intercon.com>, by kdb@intercon.com (Kurt Baumann):
> 
> 1. Stop imports for the pet trade. Period.
> 
> 2. Allow imports of birds for "certified" breeding centers, not just Zoo's.  
> Zoo's have their place but they are mainly for people to go see animals at.  
> Breeding Parrots just don't really work when people are streaming by (like at 
> the National Zoo in DC where they have been trying to breed endangered Black 
> Palms for the last several years in a small cage with people snapping flash 
> pictures at them).  It just doesn't work.
> 
> 3. Lobby all countries who now allow no exports of Parrots to open up slightly
> for exporting birds to breeding centers around the world.  Perhaps with some 
> sort of pay back by getting young birds to release into the wild.

This won't work, at least with cockatoos. If you keep them, then you must be 
aware of how intelligent and social they are. Released birds don't have the
learned background to survive (and in the case of the flock species, they can't
survive anyway without a flock, and they won't be allowed to join an existing
flock). Pet sulphur crested cockatoos released or lost in Australia don't go out
and survive in the wild, they just hang around cities trying to get their flock
cousins (people) to look after them, and die when they don't succeed.
>  
> This solution is not complete, but it is better than just cutting off the 
> imports of birds that will either die off entirely or be smuggled in anyway.  
> The buying public is just not aware of what is going on either.
> 
The birds (at least the Australian ones) are mostly holding their own. The ban
on exports of the common ones, say galahs, makes it that much harder to 
hide the rare ones that would otherwise be disguised in the exports of the 
common ones. It also drives up the price of the common ones, so that the 
smugglers concentrate more on them, and take a little pressure of the
rare ones.
Bob McKay		   Phone:	+61 6 268 8169	    fax: +61 6 268 8581
Dept. Computer Science		ACSNET,CSNET:	rim@csadfa.cs.adfa.oz
Aust. Defence Force Academy	UUCP:	...!uunet!munnari!csadfa.cs.adfa.oz!rim
Canberra ACT 2600 AUSTRALIA	ARPA:	rim%csadfa.cs.adfa.oz@uunet.uu.net