Past Projects

Aiding the Kakapo

The Kakapo is one of the rarest animals on earth. This bird is flightless and ground dwelling, making it the only parrot of its kind anywhere. Unfortunately its unique ecology is what has hastened its demise: introduced animals such as cats, rats and dogs decimated the Kakapo population so that by 1995 only 50 remained in isolated pockets on small islands surrounding New Zealand.

In late 1995 WPT trustee and veterinarian Andrew Greenwood was invited by Kakapo Recovery Programme head Don Merton to visit New Zealand and advise on various aspects of the work being done. This advice included fine tuning of the supplementary diet fed to the birds, identifying environmental cues which may trigger breeding behaviours, techniques to test fertility in free-ranging male birds, sperm collection and storage techniques, artificial insemination techniques, health monitoring, minimizing disease and contamination risks, establishing indicators of age in the birds, captive management and hand-rearing, and more.

For more detailed information on efforts to save the Kakapo, please refer to the Kakapo website.

To help support our efforts to save all parrots, please donate now.