Veterinary Conservation Biology

Abstract

IN July, I attended the symposium at Taronga Zoo on "Wildlife Health and Management in Australasia" organized by the Australian Association of Veterinary Conservation Biologists, the World Association of Wildlife Veterinarians, the Wildlife Disease Association: Australasian Section, and the Wildlife Society of the New Zealand Veterinary Association. It is worth listing all these, not just because they organized a great symposium, but because I had never heard of any of them before and suspect I may not be alone. Comprehensively, these veterinary associations are concerned about conservation biology, as was the symposium. The symposium, the Proceedings of which will be reviewed in a later edition of Pacific Conservation Biology, had sections on "conservation biology in Australasia", "sustainable utilization of wildlife", "wildlife translocation", "marine wildlife" and "wildlife health", all of which embraced issues that are topical among non-veterinary conservation biologists in the Pacific Region. However, the spin was different and, for me, eye-opening.