Findings

San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance pursues wildlife protection strategically by focusing on eight conservation hub regions on six continents. Below are recent discoveries and progress from around the world.

GIANT OTTER POPULATION STABILIZING IN PERU Led by Peruvian field assistant Alejandro Alarcon Pardo, the giant otter conservation project team has completed the annual survey of Peru’s Manu National Park population and an additional protected area. The field work included visits to 11 oxbow lakes, in which the team counted 55 individual giant otters. These numbers suggest that the population in the area is stable. Project members remain positive regarding the possibility of performing field research later in 2021.

TORREY PINE PROPAGATION Working with Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve staff, SDZWA’s plant conservation team planted 120 Torrey pine seedlings that were propagated at our Botanical Conservation Center. The project seeks to gain insight on how to undertake restoration and management of the native species. Seeking to learn more about the factors influencing seedling establishment, the team will be collecting data on various environmental variables and seedling survivorship over a five-year period.

BREEDING SEASON HAS BEGUN FOR TERNS, PLOVERS SDZWA’s terns and plovers team has begun monitoring western snowy plover and California least tern populations at Naval Base Coronado and Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. Least terns arrived in the area in late April 2021, at which time the plovers had already started courting and nesting. The team found the first plover nest at Coronado on March 22, 2021, and at Pendleton a week later. Plovers started hatching a month later, and the team had plans to band and track chicks, to assist the Navy and Marines with determining the nesting success and sustainability of their populations.

ELEPHANT SPECIES UPDATE The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) now recognizes two distinct species of elephant in Africa: the African savanna elephant Loxodonta africana and the African forest elephant Loxodonta cyclotis. Along with these designations, their status on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species has also changed, reflecting the threats both species face from poaching, habitat loss, and climate change-related drought. Savanna elephants are now considered Endangered and forest elephants are Critically Endangered.

WORKING WITH WOYLIE: AN ECOSYSTEM ENGINEER The SDZWA reproductive services team has—for the first time—banked a sample of ovarian tissue for the woylie, a rare Australian marsupial also known as the bush-tailed bettong. The tissue was cryopreserved as a source of primordial follicles and stem cells for future research in assisted reproduction. Woylie numbers have declined, due largely to the introduction of non-native species such as foxes and cats. According to the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, “the woylie is considered an important ‘ecosystem engineer’ because its digging and foraging help turn over topsoil, cycling nutrients and improving aeration and water infiltration into the soil.”

Stay after dark and help us celebrate summer during Nighttime Zoo at the San Diego Zoo. Come “rock and roar” every day this summer with music and other amazing entertainment experiences. There’s so much to do, see, and hear at Nighttime Zoo—it’s a good thing summer hours are longer!