Wildlife Week 2007 Summary
and links to reports.
Indian Wildlife Week may be a unique event
in the world. Initiated a half
century ago by Ministry of
Agriculture, the event immediately caught
on and was celebrated by foresters,
universities, zoology departments,
Zoological Survey of India branch offices,
non-governmental organisations and others
throughout India and the its
territories.
India Wildlife Week was celebrated from
1-7 October 2007 officially as has
been done for 53 years. Zoo
Outreach Organization distributes
thousands of items of educational
materials annually during Wildlife Week
to help people celebrate this event in a
more meaningful way. It also gives
us a means of promoting the species and
issues which we feel need
exposure.
This year we offered items themed on bats,
quality of zoos, Hoolock Gibbon, free
ranging monkeys, etc., but the major
focus was on behalf of amphibians
under the auspices of the AArk global
campaign. We had a rousing response
which ate up all our materials in short
order.
We had developed a packet specifically
targeting AArk and using the clever AArk
logo but use orange for brown in
the colour scheme so that it would mimic
the Indian flag for Amphibian Ark India
Campaign. Programme reports can be found
in
SANIZE module of this site
along with outstanding photos and
also in the
January and February issue of ZOOS' PRINT
magazine on
www.zoosprint.org
Out of 3000 packets, 2972 were
distributed to 56 different
organizations. Out of 1200
t-shirts, 1012 were distributed to
programme organisers and remaining has
gone to our regional amphibian training
and a regional zoo association
meeting. The t-shirts were
contributed by Le Shark, Tirpur whose
owners, Anil and Kiran Shah have a long
history of supporting such
programmes. Thanks to Chester Zoo,
World Association of Zoos and Aquariums
and Conservation Breeding Specialist
Group.
Amphibian Signature Campaign
We collected over 7000 signatures during
the Wildlife Week India campaign.
Please download the signature campaign form, get it filled out (as
many copies as possible) and return to
us so that South Asia will contribute
their share of signatures to the 2
million envisioned to collect.
Amphibian
Biodiversity Conservation (ABC) Training
Course in India --Didactic
and hands-on field training
--
Didactic and hands-on field training --
The Durrell WL Conservation Trust (DWCT)
conducted an ABC course at Periyar Tiger
Reserve, Kerala December 07 with a WAZA
and Ruffort grant. The course was
endorsed by Wildlife Institute of India,
Central Zoo Authority, Amphibian Ark,
CBSG South Asia, ZOO/WILD, and
Amphibian Network of South Asia.
Participants numbered 30 with 4 resource
persons. WAZA & Rufford
supported 19 participants and CZA, 5.
Training objective was to teach an
action mode in case of chytrid
emergencies.
Amphibian Ark-Global Leapfrog
event
--
ZOO coordinated this event in S. Asia
facilitated by SAZARC rep of AArk Steering
committee. ZOO provided materials
for four S. Asian countries: amphibian
fact sheets, frog line drawings and
amphibian information booklet from ZOO?s
amphibian ed kits. All used this
information extensively in
programmes, reported them and the
excellent media coverage throughout
S Asia. The event was
conducted in 10 zoos in Bangladesh, India,
Sri Lanka and Nepal.
Educator
Training at ABC
--
was arranged by ZOO/SANIZE with ZOOs
educators describing methods to inform
people about the amphibian crisis,
demonstrated how to use the amphibian
packets and invited biologists to join
ZOO/SANIZE as educators. ZOO finds
Field biologists as best educators as they
conduct their field work in rural areas
where such education is scarce.
Amphibian
Education programme for South Asian
Zoo Association conference
The 8th South Asian Zoo Association
conference was conducted near
Ahmedbad, Gujarat from 30 January to
03 February, 2008. ZOO's
amphibian education kit -- "FROGS
ROCK!" was the centrepiece of an
intensive education
training conducted for SAZARC
participants. The current amphibian
crisis was explained in detail along
with a brief on the status of
amphibians in South Asia.
Central
Zoo Authority International Conference
on Captive Breeding
CZA conducted their first International
Conference on the topic of captive
breeding in February 2008. Zoo
experts in population biology and
captive propagation from many countries
attended and committed to assist CZA
make a giant leap into the 21st Century
with all their programmes. Gordon
Reid, WAZA President and one of the
early AArk minders, attended and
presented an excellent talk on
amphibians, the utility of containers
and AArk sponsorship of same. At
the meeting WAZA President and SAZARC
representative could speak to the Indian
Environment Minister and Special
Secretary about the Amphibian Crisis.
Amphibians
on the Map - thanks to Sea World
Conservation Fund
CBSG & WAZA decided to "jump in" to
amphibian protection, ZOO put up a grant
for a proposal called "Amphibians on the
Map". We wrote it up by name
in our monthly magazine. It wasn't
funded ! CBSG, WAZA and Chester
Zoo all contributed something so some
kind of education programme could get
off the ground in SAsia. Recently
we submitted a similar grant to Sea
World CF. Now, thanks to SWCF,
ZOO/SANIZE/ANSA will be able to continue
AArk education aggressively in SAsian
countries due to their generous
grant. So 5 Frog adapted to South
Asian, S. Asian CAMP GAA
fresh figures for stats, CAMP
summaries suitable for laypersons,
supplying more countries in our region
will help observe YoTF 08 in a grand
manner.
Animal
Welfare Fortnightly
We had developed an amphibian packet
using welfare theme for distribution
during AWF 2008. During AWF
2008, 2000 amphibian education
packets were distributed to zoos,
forest department, Non-governmental
organizations, schools, colleges and
universities throughout India.
Thanks to Universities
for Federation of Animal Welfare, UK.
World
Environment Day WED 2008
We had developed a packet "Frog
Rock! On the Amphibian Ark!" and
printed 7000 packets to be used
during World Environment Day and
Wildlife Week . This packet has
information for everyone
interested in biodiversity and
amphibian conservation with a
poster and usual activity items
such as Frogs Matter to South
Asia booklet, placard, mask,
sticker, Rakhi and a bumper
sticker meant to be stick on the
vehicle bumper. Thanks to
Chester Zoo, UK.
South
Asia AArk Summer Alert or
South Asia AArk SA
Amphibian Crisis campaigners
should continue to create
awareness among public and policy
makers about the perilous plight
of amphibians in South Asia and
virtually all regions of the
world.
AArk South Asia intends for the
campaign to:
·
Increase
awareness and understanding of
the amphibian extinction crisis
and Amphibian Ark?s role
·
Motivate
individuals and organizations to
contribute their time and energy
to educate others about the need
to protect amphibian.
·
Increase
awareness of environmental
protection and related issues
such as global warming.
We had developed a sticker
and a bookmark combined of AArk SA logo and
some frog facts. This is a
give-a-way material. Any
one can just zip into a school
room or class, or a children?s
party, or even some other
organiser?s NGO?s World
Environment Day and give a very
short presentation about the
Amphibian Crisis and give each
child the sticker and a
bookmark with an Amphibian theme
and some simple facts.
Our education staff and local partners
will be hitting schools and
zoos in Coimbatore on WED
with these handouts, wearing a
frog mask and a t-shirt.
Thanks
to Sea World Conservation Fund.
To know more about related
programmes click below:
2008
Year of the Frog;
India Campaign for Amphibian
Aark;
Signature Campaign
