CAPTIVE BREEDING IN ENDANGERED WILDLIFE: A REVIEW

Abstract

The captive breeding is one aspect of species conservation efforts, which involve breed animals of an endangered species in captivity with the goal of releasing them back into the wild at some time in the future. The captive breeding of endangered wildlife animals is often necessary for their conservation. It prevents the extinction of a species, subspecies or population. Small captive populations are likely to become extinct. Detailed breeding plans based on the principles of population genetics and demography can greatly increase their chances of long-term survival. Captive breeding started with small number of founder population potentially increases the chances of inbreeding that lead to poor fitness of these populations, decrease in genetic diversity and reproductive and survival rates leading to increased extinction risk.