A genetic rescue plan for the King Island scrubtit

The King Island Scrubtit Acanthornis magna greeniana is a critically endangered subspecies of the Tasmanian scrubtit. The taxon is ranked as the third most likely Australian bird to go extinct within by 2038 (Geyle et al. 2018). Efforts to understand the current size and distribution of scrubtits on King Island commenced in 2011 and showed that the population contains fewer than 100 individuals that occupy three subpopulations on King Island that together comprise an area of less than one square kilometre.Disease screening the population - We will develop a comprehensive disease profile of the KI scrubtit population by obtaining blood, faecal and feather samples from KI scrubtits from all three subpopulations to establish existing prevalence of key diseases including malaria, feather mites, beak & feather disease, pox and gastrointestinal parasites. This information will inform subsequent steps in genetic rescue of the population.