Since the 1980s, animals in accredited zoos and aquariums have been managed as populations through cooperative breeding, with a goal of maintaining ex situ populations that are as demographically viable and genetically diverse as possible. Here, we provide what we believe to be the first large-scale assessment of whether cooperative breeding programs are achieving this goal over time. Using a comprehensive dataset spanning nearly 20 years and encompassing more than 400 ex situ vertebrate populations, we applied Bayesian hierarchical modeling to quantify changes in seven population metrics over time. Instead of the general declines expected for small and often closed populations like those in zoos and aquariums, we found no change in the demographic and genetic characteristics of the majority of these populations. Our results indicate that while some zoo and aquarium populations are currently unsustainable, cooperative management is helping to slow or prevent declines in the health of many ex situ populations.

中文翻译：

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在大多数动物园和水族馆种群中未发现预期的人口和遗传下降

自 1980 年代以来，经认可的动物园和水族馆中的动物一直通过合作育种作为种群进行管理，目标是维持尽可能具有人口活力和遗传多样性的迁地种群。在这里，我们提供了我们认为是首次大规模评估合作育种计划是否随着时间的推移实现了这一目标。使用跨越近 20 年并涵盖 400 多个异地脊椎动物种群的综合数据集，我们应用贝叶斯分层建模来量化七个种群指标随时间的变化。我们发现大多数这些种群的人口统计学和遗传特征没有变化，而不是像动物园和水族馆那样的小型且经常封闭的种群出现普遍下降。