Zoo experts hatch eight rare dove chicks in bid to save species

By Ed Chatterton

Conservationists have successfully hatched eight dove chicks in a bid to save an ultra-rare species of bird which has been extinct in the wild for over half a century.

Socorro doves are only cared for in zoo conservation-breeding programmes across Europe and North America after their numbers vanished in the wild in 1972.

Experts at Chester Zoo are now celebrating hatching eight chicks, known as squabs, bringing fresh hope the species can be brought back from the brink.

Approximately 200 birds represent the entire surviving population and the zoo hopes another clutch of eggs might now also be on the way.

Chester Zoo cares for two breeding pairs and the chicks will bolster the insurance population of Socorro doves looked after by avian specialists.

Clare Rafe,