March 2010 conservation highlights

15^th June 2010

In the field

Madagascar

• Our team have continued to support the BBC Natural History Unit film gentle lemurs in Alaotra for its  series on Madagascar which should air either in 2011/2012 . Through a project with Imperial College students, we have also just published a paper on the community led monitoring of the gentle lemur, which is being used to revise our monitoring strategies.
• The Durrell Cruise “Aldabra and beyond” visited Ampijoroa and the wild ploughshare habitats at Baly Bay to see our conservation work. Presentations were made by Madagascar team members.
• Madagascar team is working with local villages and authorities to set up its tortoise patrol project (with US govt funding) to protect the remaining wild ploughshares.
• In the Menabe area our team continue to support the transfer of protected areas to local communities and have completed the necessary maps which demarcate management areas.
• In a similar way to Lac Bedo in 2006, Durrell is supporting the submission of the Nosivolo watershed to be submitted to the Ramsar Convention as a wetland of global importance. This will have an important impact on conservation in the area.
• The management of the captive Madagascar pochard continues to be supported by Durrell staff. One of the challenges remains finding sustainable source of food for the ducks.

Mauritius

• In a major achievement for the project and following extensive preparations, Nik Cole has led the translocation of 500 Telfair’s skinks and 50 Guenther’s geckos in three trips by helicopter from Round Island to Ile aux Aigrettes. This translocation will boost the population on Ile Aux Aigrettes and will hopefully have a major impact on remaining invasive species such as African land snails and musk shrews.

St Lucia

• The ongoing eradication of alien introduced green iguanas to St Lucia remains the priority and we are preparing to issue a reward for any information that leads to the capture of these iguanas.
• The annual white breasted thrasher surveys began on 5th March with Durrell volunteers, which is the fifth year of annual monitoring. Surrounded by areas of hotel development, there is a small patch of high quality forest which still contains high numbers of birds.
• We have also just published a paper showing that ongoing and planned tourism developments may soon negatively impact almost 35% of the global distribution of this Endangered species, and the paper makes a range of conservation recommendations.
• Analyses of the Saint Lucia parrot population survey are near-complete now, and providing additional information on habitat use which can be used to guide development of the Saint Lucia Forestry Dept’s 10-year forest management plan.

Montserrat

• The field trials came to a close at the beginning of March, with our volunteer, Sarah Louise Smith, returning to the UK. The field trials have been a major undertaking and really a cutting edge attempt to see if we can enhance the survival of mountain chickens in the field. The volcanic eruptions in February, which coated the field site in thick ash (see blog postings) will have had a significant impact on the observation period of the trials though.
• We would like to thank all the volunteers who have worked with the field project to date for all their hard work and dedication: Andres Fernandez, Gonçalo Rosa and Linn Lagerström

Western Caribbean

• A Darwin Initiative funded project to help save the outstanding levels of globally threatened biodiversity in the Massif de la Hotte, Haiti has now officially started.  With 42 globally threatened vertebrate species, including 15 EN or CR frogs endemic to the mountain range, the Massif de la Hotte is one of the most important sites for species conservation in the world.  BirdLife International, ZSL as well as Durrell are the UK partners working alongside a number of Haitian partners to deliver the project.

Comoro islands

• Jill Key took part in a workshop in the Comoros to start the process of developing a new NGO as part of the livelihoods and biodiversity project led by Bristol Zoo, for which Durrell is a partner. Through Rich Young, we are leading the biodiversity work and supporting the capacity development components of the project.

Galapagos

• Francesca, our new field manager, has completed a second 15 day field trip to Playa Tortuga Negra between 4th-19th of March. There was an overall increase in activity, which could be linked to the nesting season having begun, although only one female was seen. A total of 18 new Mangrove Finch nests were found, which is very positive.
• The rat control programme seems to be working with no rats found in the Tomahawk traps laid out.
• Following expert consultation, changes are being made to the translocation plans for finches to Bahía Cartago on the east of Isabella. There is a high risk of failure in the currently identified release site, partly due to logistic difficulties of moving the birds there, but also in managing the area. The revised plan is to assess the habitat quality at Bahía Urbina, a mangrove site only 25km to the south of the current primary site.

Training

DESMAN

• Twelve conservation professionals from 11 developing countries were deep into the 12 week Durrell Endangered Species Management Graduate Certificate (DESMAN) course this month.  The course is providing them with the social, managerial and fund-raising skills to complement their growing biological understanding of endangered species recovery.  This cross-disciplinary approach will ensure they have the ability to lead their own recovery programmes when they return home at the start of May.  The course is accredited through the University of Kent, thereby providing students with a recognisable qualification to help them in their career progression

Leadership Skills for Conservation Managers

• As part of the process of developing the DESMAN student’s leadership skills we ran our highly successful Leadership Skills for Conservation Managers course this month, in collaboration with the Jersey Business School.  This partnership enables us to capture what has been learnt in the business world in how to create and manage teams and transfer it to conservation managers in the field

Mauritius field-skills training course

• Working in partnership with the Mauritius Wildlife Foundation we ran our field skills course for the next generation of conservation professionals in Mauritius.  Fourteen undergraduate students from Nottingham Trent University attended the training and conducted research projects, including one which demonstrated the impact of the re-introduced Telfair’s skinks as a successful predator of the invasive pest, the giant African land snail, on the offshore island of Ile aux Aigrettes. This project illustrated the value of reintroducing native species to their original habitats as they can help restore their own systems
• We secured funding from the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria to run a training course in Madagascar to build local skills in detecting chytrid fungus should it arrive on the island.  Chytrid has spread around the world and has sent numerous species of amphibian to extinction.  Currently the fungus has not been detected in Madagascar.  This course and the plans developed from it will enable us to have an early warning system to detect chytrid and try to contain it should it reach Madagascar, a globally-important centre of amphibian diversity

Wildlife park

• Two Livingstone’s fruit bats were born. These critically endangered animals, thought to number less than 1200 in the wild, has been slow to breed since their arrival at the Trust in the early 90s. Durrell is one of only three institutions in the world that holds these animals and was instrumental in establishing the captive population.
• Funding was secured to complete major renovations to the Livingstone fruit bat enclosure which will allow us to make it thermally efficient in the colder months and build an improved viewing platform so that visitors will be able to see the bats all year round. 
• Twin emperor tamarins were born, adding to the family currently free-ranging in our woodland. This species is part of a European Endangered Species programme (EEP).
• A ring-tailed lemur was born (the first time we have bred this EEP species in 17 years). Mother and infant are doing well and delighting visitors to the Kirindy Forest exhibit where this family is housed.
• Six lesser night geckos hatched in our dedicated breeding facilities within the reptile house, adding to the captive population that is earmarked for a future translocation.
• The States of Jersey Environment Department delivered 11 clumps of agile frog spawn to the zoo as part of the ‘head-starting’ programme for this species. They will be reared in our custom-made biosecure containers for later return to Ouaisne and Noirmont. This collaborative conservation programme is now showing signs of long-term success with approximately 100 clumps of spawn observed in the wild so far this year.
• Large numbers of our pied tamarins were caught up and X-rayed as part of an ongoing project into assessing UV requirement . This critically endangered species is susceptible to metabolic bone disease in captivity and this project aims to assess optimal supplementation levels.

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