Disadvantages: Genetic diversity is reduced (fewer breeding partners) Some species born in captivity may not be able to be released into the wild as they wouldn’t cope (can’t hunt for food efficiently)

Poor zoo records to guide breeding programmes. Inbreeding may occur and can cause loss of fitness and ‘inbreeding depression’, which leads to infertility. Some animals will not breed in captivity. Collection of viable sperm may be difficult – some wild animals will not cooperate!

Benefits of selective breeding include:

• new varieties may be economically important, by producing more or better quality food.
• animals can be selected that cannot cause harm, for example cattle without horns.

• Pro 1. Zoos educate the public about animals and conservation efforts.
• Pro 2. Zoos produce helpful scientific research.
• Pro 3. Zoos save species from extinction and other dangers.
• Con 1. Zoos don’t educate the public enough to justify keeping animals captive.
• Con 2. Zoos are detrimental to animals’ physical health.
• Con 3.

Captive populations can be used for educational purposes, exhibition of rare or interesting species, research, and for conservation. In conservation situations, zoos use captive breeding as a tool to prevent extinction of a species that cannot survive in the wild, often due to the deterioration of a species’ habitat.

9 species facing extinction due to habitat loss

• Indian Elephant. Indian elephants are the first species on our endangered list due to habitat loss.
• Whale. Whales are at the top of the food chain, however in the North Atlantic only 400 exist.
• Mountain Gorilla.
• Black Rhinoceros.
• Sea Turtle.
• Orangutan.
• Red Panda.
• Tiger.

Numerous animals are killed by zoos when they don’t sufficiently contribute to profits or fit into the facilities’ master plans. Animals may be killed because their genes are “overrepresented” in captive wildlife populations or to make room for younger animals who attract larger crowds.

Top 10 Extinct Animals

1. Sabre-toothed Cat. Often called Sabre-toothed Tigers or Sabre-toothed Lions, they existed 55 million to 11,700 years ago.
2. Woolly Mammoth. An enormous mammal, believed to be closely related to the modern-day elephant.
3. Dodo.
4. Great Auk.
5. Stellers Sea Cow.
6. Tasmanian Tiger.
7. Passenger Pigeon.
8. Pyrenean Ibex.

15 Animals That Will Be Extinct By 2050 If We Don’t Help

• Orangutans. Orangutans play an important role in their environment by feasting on fruit and spreading out the seeds around the ecosystem.
• Lemurs.
• Hawksbill turtle.
• Rhinos.
• Polar bears.
• Gorillas.
• Vaquitas.
• Cheetahs.

Tigers. Tigers are recorded to have killed more people than any other big cat, and have been responsible for more human deaths through direct attack than any other wild mammal.

The ice age happened after the dinosaurs. The dinosaurs died out prior to the Pleistocene age, which was the last of five ice ages that spanned…

These clusters of specialized, cooperating cells eventually became the first animals, which DNA evidence suggests evolved around 800 million years ago. Sponges were among the earliest animals.

Dinosaurs first appeared between 247 and 240 million years ago. They ruled the Earth for about 175 million years until an extinction event 65.5 million years ago wiped out all of them, except for the avian dinosaurs.

Other than birds, however, there is no scientific evidence that any dinosaurs, such as Tyrannosaurus, Velociraptor, Apatosaurus, Stegosaurus, or Triceratops, are still alive. These, and all other non-avian dinosaurs became extinct at least 65 million years ago at the end of the Cretaceous Period.

The good old days. About 60 million years ago, after ocean dinosaurs went extinct, the sea was a much safer place. Marine reptiles no longer dominated, so there was lots of food around, and birds like penguins had room to evolve and grow. Eventually, penguins morphed into tall, waddling predators.

Dinosaurs (TV series)

First Dinosaurs. Approximately 230 million years ago, during the Triassic Period, the dinosaurs appeared, evolved from the reptiles. Plateosaurus was one of the first large plant-eating dinosaurs, a relative of the much larger sauropods. It grew to about 9 meters in length.

The theory gained even more steam when scientists were able to link the extinction event to a huge impact crater along the coast of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. At about 93 miles wide, the Chicxulub crater seems to be the right size and age to account for the dino die-off.

For decades, the prevailing theory about the extinction of the dinosaurs was that an asteroid from the belt between Mars and Jupiter slammed into the planet, causing cataclysmic devastation that wiped out most life on the planet. The gravity from Jupiter pulled the comet into the solar system.

Non-bird dinosaurs lived between about 245 and 66 million years ago, in a time known as the Mesozoic Era. This was many millions of years before the first modern humans, Homo sapiens, appeared. Scientists divide the Mesozoic Era into three periods: the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous.