Beyond threatened species and reintroduction: establishing priorities for conservation and breeding programmes for European rodents in zoos

Abstract

Conservation resources and interest are disproportionately directed towards large charismatic mammals, both in zoos and in situ. The order Rodentia represents c. 40% of known mammalian species, and rodents (and other small mammals) could be viewed by zoos as tools to demonstrate their commitment to conservation through local captive‐breeding and reintroduction programmes. However, it is necessary to identify the true degree of threat to species before investing the limited resources available to conservation efforts. Population declines at the local or regional level do not necessarily indicate a threat to species survival at the global level, and interest in small mammals and the location of the majority of zoos do not appear to overlap with hotspots of endemicity for rodents. Education, especially if coupled with habitat‐improvement activities, is essential to increasing public participation and support for biodiversity conservation. In this article we present the general principles that should be considered when establishing conservation priorities for small mammals, specifically in Europe but which apply equally across the globe.

Experimental island invasion of house mice

“…The house mouse is an archetypal invasive species (Gabriel et al 2010) and the tenets of the small population paradigm apparently did not apply to this invasive species, at least during initial establishment and spread. This is in contrast to other, threatened, mouse species which do suffer from the negative effects of small population size (Gippoliti and Amori 2007). The reason this invasive population could overcome the 'genetic paradox' of invasion is likely due to its high reproductive rate, as well as supplemental immigration during the invasion (Frankham 2005).…”

The Genetic Legacy of Multiple Beaver Reintroductions in Central Europe

“…This leads to the conclusion that using admixed beavers from any of the western ESUs as source population for reintroduction programs in Western Europe is well justified. While we do not want to interfere with ongoing conservation planning aimed at protection the purebred relict populations in Europe [50] , e.g. C. f. albicus in Germany, we at least question the long-term appropriateness of this approach.…”

Species’ surrogacy for conservation planning: caveats from comparing the response of three arboreal rodents to habitat loss and fragmentation

“…The main consequence of the lack of a comparative approach is that, to date, we do not know if these species diVer in their response to habitat fragmentation or what the magnitude of the diVerences are, consequently the possibility of optimizing conservation eVorts remains unexplored. Considering that the three species are, or have been, the object of various independent species-speciWc reintroduction/habitat restoration projects (Fornasari et al 1997;Wauters et al 1997;Bright and Morris 1996;Gippoliti and Amori 2007;Jurczyszyn 2001;G. Amori pers.…”