To gather up many pieces of good advice, Citizen Conservation has invited its advisory board to a joint meeting at the CC office in Berlin on 17 and 18 January 2025. We discussed the progress of our individual species conservation programmes as well as the strategic direction of our entire species conservation initiative. This is the eighth time that CC’s advisory boards have met for a major workshop at a year’s beginning – a real tradition.
Expertise input
How can we manage conservation breeding programmes for individual amphibian, fish and reptile species, so it results in healthy offspring in our aquariums and terrariums even four decades later with as little loss of genetic diversity as possible? To ensure that we would be able to release viable animals back into the wild at any time. And to ensure that we can keep them in human care for a longer period of time, as a safeguard against of the threatening conditions in their original habitats. How do you deal with animals that are no longer needed in the breeding programmes? Which veterinary examinations should be carried out routinely? How are our stocks developing? For which species should a CC programme be set up in the near future? And of course: How will we manage to finance our ambitious programme for the coming years and decades?
Frequently asked questions - good answers
We also presented our new FAQ, which will be available on our website from the beginning of 2025 and will answer all frequently asked questions about our programme. We also offered insight into the progress of our wildlife database Wild at Home, which will be finalised in the coming months and made available to the public next year. It goes without saying that we also reported on the development of CC in the past year 2024.
In the plenary session, Tina Nagorzanski and Heiko Werning present the questions that CC is asked most frequently and also provide the answers.
CC Managing Director Björn Encke faces tricky questions about population management at Citizen Conservation.
Vanessa Dubberke on the progress of the project Wild at Home
Concept designer Bea Seggering presents a new click dummy from the online platform Wild at Home.
Input from the zoo association: VdZ President Jörg Junhold and Zoo Director of Schönbrunn Zoo Stephan Hering-Hagenbeck
The Reptile Advisory Board discusses veterinary procedures for snakes, tortoises and co.
The amphibian advisory board in the glass terrarium
Philipp Wagner, curator at the Allwetterzoo Münster, is the ideal contact person when it comes to turtles.
Fabian Schmidt, curator at Basel Zoo, has been supporting the CC Advisory Board since last year.
Expertise and reliable contacts
Lucky are those who can discuss such fundamental questions with the best minds in the animal husbandry community. CC is in this fortunate position! With top experts from zoos, private animal breeding, science, veterinary medicine and trade, we discussed, deliberated and planned intensively on Saturday both in the plenary session and in the smaller specialist circles on individual animal groups. This weekend of concentrated ex-situ expertise was rounded off on Friday with a joint strategy meeting of the Verband der Zoologischen Gärten (VdZ), the Stiftung Artenschutz and CC in the premises of the Federal Press Conference in Berlin and on Sunday with the regular strategy meeting of the CC Supervisory Board. It goes without saying that the evenings did not go unused in all of this, but were used just as intensively to strengthen personal bonds – because they are the backbone of our work all year round. So let’s head into the new year 2025 with our backs strengthened by the most valuable advice we could get for our projects!