Comparing body condition estimates of zoo Brother’s Island Tuatara (Sphenodon guntheri) to that of the wild, a clinical case

Citation

Thompson K, Schlegel M. 2009. Comparing body condition estimates of zoo Brother’s Island Tuatara (Sphenodon guntheri) to that of the wild, a clinical case. In Ward A, Treiber K, Schmidt D, Coslik A, Maslanka M, Eds. Proceedings of the Eighth Conference on Zoo and Wildlife Nutrition, AZA Nutrition Advisory Group, Tulsa, OK.

Abstract

Brother’s Island tuataras (Sphenodon guntheri) housed at the San Diego Zoo were measured and weighed routinely as part of the preventative medicine procedure. From June 2000 through April 2009, snout-vent length and mass were used from that data and compared to Brother’s Island tuataras that were sampled by Hoare et al., in the wild from 1957 to 2001. Along with comparing snout-vent length (SVL) and mass, body condition was estimated using the ratio of the log-transformed mass to the log-transformed snout-vent length. The tuataras that are cared for by the San Diego Zoo (SDZ) are larger and have a greater conditioning score than that of the tuataras sampled in the wild. Over the 9 year period of sampling the SDZ tuatara had a mean increased in mass of 125.2 %, SVL of 31.7 %, and body condition estimates (BCE) of 7.5%.

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