Programme Manager's Message

Already halfway through the year, and we have a great deal to report in this edition of our newsletter, with plenty of news from the field, a training update, a new application deadline for 2007 awards announced, a new team member joining us, and the Society for Conservation Biology Annual Meeting to look forward to!

Award Winner Training
From the 26th May until 7th June, representatives from 18 Future Conservationist Award winning teams came together in North Wales, UK, to learn a variety of skills, including conservation education, communications, people-oriented research, project planning and management skills. This training aimed to assist participants in carrying out their projects, and allowed them an opportunity to meet and share ideas with one another and a range of world-class conservation experts. We certainly enjoyed spending time with them and learning more about their conservation efforts and the context in which they work, and hope they got a lot out of the workshops too!

Conservation Without Borders
Having just returned from an intensive two weeks of training in the mountains of North Wales, the BP Conservation Programme team is now energetically launching into an exciting week in San Jose, California at the Society for Conservation Biology’s 20th Annual Meeting, “Conservation Without Borders.” Representatives from each of the eight 2006 Conservation Follow-up and Conservation Leadership Award winning projects will attend the meeting (along with more than 15 other past award winners) and present their initial research findings to an international audience of more than 1500 conservation practitioners.

Programme Changes
Over the past year, many of you know the programme partners have been engaging in extensive discussions concerning the future direction of the BP Conservation Programme. The partnership continues to recognise the need to encourage a greater number of young people to pursue careers in conservation, and has been challenged to find ways to build on efforts in key areas.

Welcome Program Officer Lynn Duda
I'm pleased to introduce Lynn Duda, our newest member of the BPCP team, who will be working with WCS in New York within their International Training and Capacity Building team. Lynn comes to us with some useful experience behind her! She has traveled as a field ornithologist in many different countries, particularly in Central and South America, covering research topics ranging from looking at the effects of fragmentation in Amazonian Brazil, to population trends of neotropical migrants on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica.

Having taught Wildlife Management Field Techniques at the University of Rhode Island, managed a migratory bird banding station, and lead a conservation semester abroad program in the Ecuadorian Andes, Lynn is now looking forward applying her expertise whilst working with us on the Programme. Using her French, Spanish and Portuguese speaking skills, she was able to quickly make friends with participants at the Winner’s Training in Wales, UK on her first assignment with us earlier this month. I hope you'll join me in welcoming her to the Programme!

Marianne Carter, BP Conservation Programme Manager

7 – 11 August ESRI User Conference, San Diego, California, USA

13 – 19 August 24th International Ornithological Congress, Hamburg, Germany

22 – 26 August 1st European Congress of Conservation Biology, Eger, Hungary

3 – 7 September VII International Conference for Wildlife Management in Amazonia and Latin America, Bahia, Brazil

Kate Stokes Memorial Award

On 19th February 2006, our colleague and dear friend, Kate Stokes, tragically passed away. Kate worked with us as Programme Officer for four years and had an enormous impact on hundreds of young conservationists during that time. Her warmth, energy, enthusiasm and commitment will be terribly missed.

In partnership with Kate’s family, we have established the Kate Stokes Memorial Award in her honor to support young conservationists around the world. We have already raised over £32,000 ($60,000), but are aiming to reach a minimum of £40,000 ($80,000). To donate to this fund, please send a cheque (British Pounds or US Dollars) to: FFI, Great Eastern House, Tenison Road, Cambridge, CB1 2TT. Please make cheques payable to “Fauna & Flora International” and state it is for Kate’s Award.

In 2007 the programme will be focusing our efforts in 20 countries where BP has a significant business interest. This will enable us to really make a significant contribution to conservation capacity building needs in these locations, and will allow BP to be of greater assistance to the teams we support.

Read more about these changes taking place within the Programme.

News From the Field

AFRICA

Rainforest Reserves for Critically Endangered Comorian Fruit Bats (Gold Award 2005)
The past few months have been exciting for our project team, as we have finished our ecological surveys of potential forest reserve sites and social surveys of neighboring villages. The field ecology work was often difficult, on steep mountain slopes with heavy rain, but we were able to collect all the data we hoped for and more at seven remote forest sites.

Tulbagh Renosterveld Project, South Africa (Silver Award 2005)
We have completed our field work phase and at the moment we are doing feedback sessions with the various landowners in the Tulbagh Valley. This process had to be a bit delayed because the period from March to May is sowing time for farmers. However, we have had feedback sessions with two of the key landowners in the Tulbagh Valley, and our interactions with the landowners have been fantastic.

Vision 2005: An integrated conservation and development project for the Kikuyu Escarpment Forest, Kenya (Consolidation Award 2005)
The Kijabe Environment Volunteers (KENVO) team in Kenya launched ‘Project Vision 2005: An Integrated Conservation and Development Project for the Kikuyu Escarpment Forest” in August 2005. Since then, various activities have been carried out.

Evaluation, Present Distribution and Condition of Manatee in Cuanza River, Angola (Silver Award 2005)
The shy and elusive African Manatee (Trichechus senegalensis) is a little known, important and endangered species found in the rivers of Angola. Two years ago, Michel Morais of the Agostinho Neto University sought BP’s assistance to conduct a study on this charismatic creature in the Cuanza River basin. With the aid of a grant from the BP Conservation Programme and local logistical support from BP, work began last year.

Bat Conservation, Madagascar (Consolidation Award 2004)
Education and teacher training workshops, flying foxes captured in 20 meter high canopy nets and the giant leaf-nosed bat tracked to reveal its forest roosts for the first time ever – it’s all happening for the Bat Conservation Madagascar team! Now in its second year, the national NGO called Madagasikara Voakajy, set up with a Consolidation Award, continues to go from strength to strength.

Read more about projects in Africa...

ASIA / PACIFIC

CROC Project, Philippines (Consolidation Award 2005)
Eight young conservationists from the Philippines and the Netherlands are collecting data, campaigning and working with rural communities and local governments to protect the Philippine crocodile in its natural habitat. The CROC project is the first in-situ conservation project for the species. What started as an effort of a few young guys to collect data on a single species, has now transformed into an integrated collaborative conservation strategy for conserving wetlands in one of the most important global conservation hotspots.

Extending Chelonian Research, Education and Conservation, Cambodia (Follow-up Award 2005)
The project has been running since 2004 and is focusing on freshwater turtle and tortoise research in Central Cardamom Protected Forest, and was recently extended to all of southwest Cambodia. We have recently found one more endangered turtle species – the Yellow-headed Temple Turtle, Hieremys annandalii, and additional information on key sites for turtle conservation to add to the previous research.

Distribution, habitat preference and conservation status of the giant endemic rats Solomys ponceleti and S. salebrosus in Solomon Islands (Gold Award 2005)
Finally! We have come across a giant rat – the Bougainville giant rat (Solomys salebrosus), which was caught by hunters in the interior village of Olivetti on Choiseul Island, Solomon Islands. The village is an eight hour walk from the coast, and accessible only by logging roads and trails.

Conservation of Tricholoma matsutake Mushroom in Northwest Yunnan, China (Silver Award 2005)
Nihau from Zhongdian, China! Project Matsutake is nearing completion after a long winter spent in labs collating and analyzing data collected by various team members. While we wrap up a small amount of field work, the bulk of our recent efforts have been disseminating our findings on sustainable harvest and reproductive biology of this mushroom to a diverse array of stakeholders.

Action Tayam Peh, Nicobar Islands (Follow-up Award 2004)
This year brought our team the much required and cherished experience of a successful field session on radio collaring the Nicobar flying fox and finally locating it in the day roost. A shy and elusive species, our team had been on the lookout for this endemic species for almost a year now.

Nepenthis Project, Sumatra (2001)
Sumatra is the second island after Borneo that has the highest diversity of Nepenthes. A team of young students who received support from the Programme in 2002 to study Nepenthes in Indonesia have been working continuously over the past four years to gather data on Nepenthes. They were recently credited with the discovery of a new species of Nepenthes from Sumatra – N. rigidifolia. Contact the BP Conservation Programme for a copy of the article published in Reinwardtia – “A new species of Nepenthes from Sumatra.”

Read more about projects in Asia and the Pacific...

EURASIA

Sustainable Bat Conservation in the Caucasus Mountains of Romania, Georgia, Poland and Armenia (Leadership Award 2006)
After couple of weeks of preparation, we are ready for this adventure!! We have purchased and prepared all the equipment, made the route plan, developed a workshop schedule, and arranged all kinds of paper work. We are now prepared to set up the next aims within this programme with each of our partners.

Developing Conservation Measures for Darevsky's Viper, Armenia (Gold Award 2005)
The habitat for Darevsky’s viper is concentrated in the volcanic highlands of the Gukasjan District of Armenia – specifically the Legli Wet Mountains of Armeno-Djavahet. The rocky, volcanic slopes rise 2000 to 2400 meters above sea level, with steep upward slopes.

Read more about projects in Eurasia...

LATIN AMERICA / CARIBBEAN

Mannophryne olmonae: An ecological study in Tobago (Future Conservationist Award 2006)
The project officially began on May 1st, 2006, which involved: 1.) logistical organisation (acquiring field license, accommodations, equipment etc); 2.) field reconnaissance; 3.) standardising field work protocols; and 4.) developing and testing the histological protocol for Chytridiomycosis (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis) detection.

Marsh Deer Project, Argentina (Consolidation Award 2005)
After a year of measuring water and soil vertical movements, the electronic sensors settled on the core of floating marshes areas have been removed.

Red Siskin (Carduelis cucullata) Research and Conservation Programme (Bronze Award 2005)
The team has been successful with the project thus far and we are progressing much better than expected. We have found Red Siskin now in six new locations and have had a 90% sighting rate at transects. I don't know how long this particular spell of luck will last, but we will enjoy it while it is around.

Saving the Blue-billed Curassow: Building a secure future in Colombia (Leadership Award 2006)
The project to conserve the Blue Billed Curassow (Crax alberti) and the tropical humid forests of the Serranía de las Quinchas in the Colombian Half Magdalena has had a successful year thus far. The team from ProAves Colombia has been focusing on consolidating strategies for conservation and the establishment of good relationships with local communities, NGOs and other academic and governmental institutions.

Assessment of Seabird Bycatch in Peruvian Artisanal Fisheries, Peru (Bronze Award 2005)
We are just returning from field visits to fishing ports in Southern Peru, including San Juan de Marcona, Mollendo and Ilo. This time we also extended our visits to Iquique port located in Northern Chile. We gave several talks to personnel from Capitanías de Puerto as well as fishermen in these ports.

Read more about projects in Latin America and the Caribbean...

Programme Alumni: Where are they now?

Catching up with Santiago D’Alessio of the Marsh Deer Project, Argentina

The seeds of the Marsh Deer Project were planted in 1995, back when Santiago D’Alessio was starting as a biology undergraduate at Buenos Aires University. After traveling to the north of Argentina and learning a little bit about the ecology of the Marsh Deer species, Santiago and his small team came back to Buenos Aires looking for information about a supposed population in the nearby Parana River Delta, but there was none to be found. After traveling to the delta islands and speaking with local residents, Santiago and his team found that there was in fact a population of the species, which was under pressure from over-hunting, and decided something must be done. Read more...

Final Reports Received

These recently concluded projects have had some exciting results. For a copy of the full report, send an email request to bp-conservation-programme@birdlife.org.uk or telephone +44 (0) 1223.277.318.

Project Websites

Check out project websites for updated news and images from award winning teams in the field: