05-19-2006, 08:16 PM
Found this:
End of road for Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit?
May 19, 2006
The last male purebred Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit has died, leaving just two females in a captive breeding program created to try to save the endangered species from extinction.
The tiny rabbits are only found in Douglas County in north-central Washington. None are believed to exist in the wild, which means the two females - Lolo and Bryn - are the only known purebred pygmy rabbits left in existence.
"This is a population that has existed since before the last Ice Age," said Jon Marvel, executive director of the Idaho-based Western Watersheds Project, which works to protect pygmy rabbit populations across the West. "Any time we lose a species it diminishes us all."
Biologists captured 16 rabbits in a remote area of Douglas County in 2001 to start the captive breeding program. The last of those rabbits, Ely, died March 30 at the Oregon Zoo in Portland, said Dave Hays, an endangered species biologist who oversees the program for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The last two Columbia Basin rabbits, both offspring of the original captured rabbits, are at the Portland zoo.
The fate of the isolated species now rests entirely on a crossbreeding program with the closely related Idaho pygmy rabbit. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has already determined that the crossbred rabbits will count toward recovery of the Columbia Basin species.
Efforts to impregnate the two purebred Washington rabbits have been unsuccessful so far, according to Chris Warren, a biologist overseeing the cross-breeding program for the federal agency.
[Associated Press]
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Now seriously, do you think that we are going to be happy with a Columbian/Idaho crossbreed pygmy rabbit? I don't think so.
End of road for Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit?
May 19, 2006
The last male purebred Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit has died, leaving just two females in a captive breeding program created to try to save the endangered species from extinction.
The tiny rabbits are only found in Douglas County in north-central Washington. None are believed to exist in the wild, which means the two females - Lolo and Bryn - are the only known purebred pygmy rabbits left in existence.
"This is a population that has existed since before the last Ice Age," said Jon Marvel, executive director of the Idaho-based Western Watersheds Project, which works to protect pygmy rabbit populations across the West. "Any time we lose a species it diminishes us all."
Biologists captured 16 rabbits in a remote area of Douglas County in 2001 to start the captive breeding program. The last of those rabbits, Ely, died March 30 at the Oregon Zoo in Portland, said Dave Hays, an endangered species biologist who oversees the program for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The last two Columbia Basin rabbits, both offspring of the original captured rabbits, are at the Portland zoo.
The fate of the isolated species now rests entirely on a crossbreeding program with the closely related Idaho pygmy rabbit. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has already determined that the crossbred rabbits will count toward recovery of the Columbia Basin species.
Efforts to impregnate the two purebred Washington rabbits have been unsuccessful so far, according to Chris Warren, a biologist overseeing the cross-breeding program for the federal agency.
[Associated Press]
----------------------------
Now seriously, do you think that we are going to be happy with a Columbian/Idaho crossbreed pygmy rabbit? I don't think so.
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