Abstract
Mariana Crow Subcommittee
traveled to the islands of Guam and Rota, Mariana Islands,
Micronesia, during the period of April 12 through 22, 1989, to
conduct field investigations of the endangered Mariana Crow
(Corvus kubaryi). The primary goal of my field trip was to
develop a live-trap method for the crow. Coordinator for the
project, I function in association with the Houston Zoological
Garden, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS),
the Guam Department of Aquatic and Wildlife Resources
(GDAWR), and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana
Islands (CNMI) in a joint effort to one day develop a captive
maintenance and propagation protocol for this bird. Major funding
for this project has been provided by the AFA with additional
monies provided by the Louisville Zoo. An American Association
of Zoological Parks and Aquariums (AAZPA) project initiated
by Dr. Robert Beck, GDAWR wildlife biologist, and Mr.
Larry Shelton, former Curator of Birds at the Philadelphia Zoo,
to save Guam's endangered forest avifauna from extinction by
captive culture, led to my 1985 field study of the crow on Guam
and my subsequent reinitiation in 1986 of a 1984 plan to captively
culture the crow.