Rehabilitation of sick or injured wildlife supports wild populations of threatened species by improving the health of individuals. Post-release assessment of the efficacy of rehabilitation relies on re-sighting and identification of both rehabilitated and comparable wild individuals. For species or age classes with naturally low survival rates and re-sighting probabilities, evaluating the longterm success of rehabilitation is challenging. We use a rehabilitation database in conjunction with a long-term monitoring database to determine rehabilitation outcomes for yellow-eyed penguin (Megadyptes antipodes) chicks across 10 breeding seasons. Although rehabilitated chicks fledged at a higher mass, their post-fledging survival probability was lower (0.23 ± 0.10-0.47 95% CI) than that of healthy (>5 kg) wild-fledging conspecifics (0.38 ± 0.26-0.51 95% CI), or even of underweight (<5 kg) chicks fledging naturally (0.28 ± 0.11-0.53 95% CI). Removing underweight chicks for rehabilitation did not improve parent survival to the following season nor did it influence future breeding propensity; c. 100% of parents subsequently attempted to breed regardless of previous breeding outcome or interventions. Most wildlife rehabilitation programmes assume that efforts are improving the conservation status of the species, but longer-term implications must be tested to ensure that scarce resources are expended on the best possible conservation outcomes.
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