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Two red-billed curassow chicks, classified as endangered, hatched in the UK zoo with the zookeepers’ help.

There are around 200 curassow chicks left in the world. Now, there are two more.

Zookeepers at the Chester Zoo in the UK found two curassow eggs. However, the parents weren’t taking care of them, so the keepers placed the eggs in a warm incubator for a month.

According to Treehugger, both eggs hatched about 30 days apart and the chicks met their parents.

We carefully returned the chicks to the parent birds for rearing and they were quickly welcomed back into the family. It’s been great to use our avicultural experience to hatch the eggs and wonderful to see the parent birds rear their chicks naturally – a technique which may help in the conservation of this species in the future.


Andrew Owen, Curator, Chester Zoo 

Red-billed curassows are native to Brazil. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), there are about 130 to 170 rare birds in the world, and curassow are close to being qualified as critically endangered.

That’s why these two chicks are an important addition to the curassow global population and a success of conservation efforts.

Marina is passionate about sustainability and works to help ensure our planet stays as our home for a long time. She takes part in environmental conservation by recycling and not buying single-use plastic.

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