If these are the result of a pair bred in 2011 are we to assume this is a result of brother/sister mating? Can't imagine there are many other unrelated Antillean iguanas in captivity outside their natural range.
There is a lone male Antillean in Rotterdam. Schoennbrunn Wien, Zoopark Zajezd in Europe. Chester Zoo might still have them behind the scenes (not sure though ...).
The zoo's Annual Report says that they do not. The animals at Chester were bred at Jersey: I do not know about those at the other zoos. Alan
Four young choughs have fledged in the wild at Sorrell Point. These are from two pairs; a third pair had young but did not fledge any. Six captive bred birds have been released successfully. These are two birds that were parent raised, and four that were part foster raised by the Italian Chough that is human socialised, and part hand reared. There are now thirty free-living choughs on the north coast of Jersey.
Thanks for this news. So ten new recruits this year. Do you know if that means they won't get any more from Paradise Park this year?
This is likely to be the last year of releases using Paradise Park birds. I think the plan is to only release males to redress the inbalance in sexes in the free-living population.
More on the Choughs : "As some of you may already know, not all of Durrell’s island based conservation programmes are carried out in exotic locations. We're just as committed to preserving Jersey’s biodiversity and saving the island's native species from extinction too! The first release of this year’s captive bred choughs took place on the 21st of July. 6 two-month old chicks were released from their aviary to join the current flock of 24 free-living choughs. If you have the chance to visit the choughs at Sorel, you'll be able to spot the younger choughs as they have a different physical appearance to the adults. The youngest chicks have a grey-yellow bill and the slightly older chicks have an orange colouration. Eventually, these colours will develop into the trademark red bill. At the moment, there are 30 choughs flying free on the north coast of Jersey. Hopefully they will start exploring and making appearances in other parts of the island too!"
How many aye-ayes do Jersey have now following this birth? Someone told me there were five pairs including the new parents of this baby?
After some further research it appears there are 7 aye ayes at the zoo following the new birth; 3 male, 3 females and 1 unknown gender.
Great news from the Madagascar pochard project : https://www.durrell.org/blog/100-and-counting--worlds-rarest-duck-reaches-its-first-century/
Choughs I was chuffed to see some of the Choughs at Sorel Point on Sunday. The Chough tracker from Durrell was about and pointed us in the right direction and they flew over us several times. A beautiful spot with a motocross event taking place next to the National Trust land - rather incongruous, but the Choughs didn't seem to mind.
In sad news, the last Echo Parakeet at Durrell, and indeed outside of Mauritius, died last week. He was 21 years old, and had been at the Park since 2000. Durrell says farewell to Mr Brown, the echo parakeet | Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust
Sad indeed - but at least his species is in better shape these days. I guess he would have been one of the birds I saw in 2005.
The new chief executive officer, Dr Leslie Dickie, has been talking about why Durrell should definitely be considered a zoo, despite the park's name: ‘Durrell is a zoo – a major one’ « Jersey Evening Post Rather interested by this quote: "Zoo is a good word, and visitors to the Island – people from Germany and France – look for that word. In Germany, a wildlife park means wild deer and boar. We carried out a survey recently of people leaving the Airport and many did not know that Durrell exists." I wonder if this is a problem faced by other zoos that refer to themselves by another title, or if this is more endemic to Jersey.
