From Archey’s frogs to Asian elephants – a compendium of WildWork at Auckland Zoo by Richard Gibson – Head of Life Sciences at Auckland Zoo
Richard Gibson – is Head of Life Sciences at Auckland Zoo and is responsible for all aspects of animal care and welfare, veterinary services and the domestic and international field conservation programme. He has almost 30 years experience in a range of internationally renowned zoos and NGO’s and has undertaken field conservation programmes in around a dozen countries including, most recently, New Zealand.
His favourite group of animals is snakes…something he struggles with daily in Aotearoa!
This presentation will afford a broad introduction to the zoo’s field conservation programme with a focus on our domestic field programme…with some time left for questions at the end.
Auckland Zoo is a very good, modern zoo, and is so much more than a wonderful day out. Our extended whanau of >700,000 annual visitors, as well as our expansive online community, are core to our Mission of “bringing people together to build a future for wildlife’.
We believe that the disconnect between people and wildlife has never been so great, and for people to care about wildlife - enough to change something in their lives in favour of wildlife and wild places - then we need to rebuild that connection.
Enabling our visitors to have memorable engaging, educational, and emotional experiences is therefore, our raison d’être.
However, the zoo is also very committed to actions beyond our boundaries and local communities.
For more than a decade the zoo’s conservation fund has supported a comprehensive portfolio of in situ conservation projects across the globe and since the completion of Te Wao Nui, the zoo’s Aotearoa precinct, we have also implemented and grown an expansive programme of hands-on field conservation ventures across Aotearoa and into the South Pacific. The combined investment of staff time, funds and other resources is now on a scale matched by few other zoos of our size.
This is part of the Third Thursday Talks lecture series brought to you by Forest & Bird Waitakere. Monthly talks for members and non-members interested in a wide range of environmental topics. Free but koha appreciated to cover hall hire. For more info: Waitakere.branch@forestandbird.org.nz