Factors Affecting The Reproductive Success Of The Crested Ibis Nipponia Nippon

The Crested Ibis Nipponia nippon, which is endemic to Eastern Asia, was listed as a National Protected Species (Category I) in China, and as Critically Endangered by Collar et al. (1994) and on the IUCN Red List until 2000. However, it's Red List category was changed to Endangered (in BirdLife International 2000, 2001, and on IUCN Red Lists since 2000) because of the rapid increase in the wild population at Yangxian. The species once distributed in Japan, Korea, Russia and most parts of central China. Overexploitation and destruction of habitat led to the successive extinction of the Russian, Korea and Japanese population during the 20th century (Won 1971, Archibald 1978, Yamashina 1983). The Chinese population, once also thought to be extinct from 1960s, was rediscovered in Yangxian, Shaanxi Province in 1981 (Liu 1981). Since then great conservation efforts have been taken by Chinese government to restore both the in-situ and ex-situ populations and received a great success. In the past 24 years, the wild population has increased from 7 individuals to approximately 360 birds and with another 422 birds in captivity.The preface aims to describe the past and current distribution, extinguishing process and status of managements of the Crested Ibis; The breeding biology which refers to breeding success was summarized and the factors affecting the breeding success in each stage of a breeding bout were highlighted in the Results section; Comparisons among factors affecting the reproductive success were made in Discussion section, as well as the measurements taken in the management.A single clutch of 1-5 eggs (usually three) was laid per year, between the 14th of March and the 8th of April. The laying date varied significantly (t=13.923, P=0.000, d/=50) between years and averaged at 11.2 ±5.8 (n=51) days after the 14th of March. A total of 271 clutches (including 770 eggs) were laid from 1981 to 2004. The average clutch size was 2.84 ± 0.77 (n=271). There was a slight fluctuation in clutch size which varied highly significantly (t=32.76, P=0.000, df =23) during the 24 years.The feeding visits of parent birds highly increased with the brood size (Pearson...