- In 2016, conservationists started restoring the island of Redonda, a part of Antigua and Barbuda within the Caribbean, by eradicating invasive rats and goats.
- Shortly after eradicating these invasive species, vegetation on the island sprang again to life, and seabirds and different wildlife recolonized the island.
- In September 2023, the federal government of Antigua and Barbuda introduced it had established the Redonda Ecosystem Reserve, protecting practically 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of land and sea.
- Experts say they hope Redonda’s restoration and successive safety might be used as a mannequin for comparable initiatives throughout the Caribbean.
Seven years in the past, Redonda, a volcanic island within the Caribbean Sea, resembled the moon’s floor: a dusty, debris-covered, barren terrain.
The island, which is a part of Antigua and Barbuda, had as soon as been mined for guano, seabird excrement used for fertilizer. However, mining operations on Redonda ceased across the begin of World War I, and when the miners had been gone, they left behind a legacy of rats and goats.
Over the successive a long time, the rats and goats stripped Redonda of its vegetation. Rocks and soil slid into the ocean, damaging the reefs and seagrass and making it harmful for anybody to enterprise onto the island.
Then, in 2016, conservationists started eradicating the rats and goats to revive the island. They first used a rodenticide to remove the rats whereas not harming different biodiversity. Then, they captured and transported the small inhabitants of goats by helicopter off the island, most of whom had been ravenous as a result of lack of meals on Redonda.
Once these invasive animals had been gone, Redonda reworked quicker than anybody may have imagined. Native timber and grasses sprouted again. Seabirds like brown boobies (Sula leucogaster) and red-billed tropicbirds (Phaethon aethereus) recolonized the island. According to conservation consultants working to revive Redonda, the inhabitants of the critically endangered and endemic Redonda floor dragon (Ameiva atrata) has elevated thirteenfold since 2017.
“The island was in such a dreadful state that everyone thought it was going to need an awfully long time to recover,” Jenny Daltry, Caribbean alliance director for the NGOs Re:wild and Fauna & Flora International, advised Mongabay. “But we were seeing changes really fast.”
After the profitable restoration of Redonda, the federal government of Antigua and Barbuda introduced this month that it had established the Redonda Ecosystem Reserve, protecting practically 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of land and sea, an space 1 / 4 the scale of Rome, which encompasses the terrain of the island in addition to the seagrass meadows and coral reef surrounding it.
Arica Hill, the chief director of the Environmental Awareness Group (EAG), an NGO primarily based in Antigua and Barbuda that was concerned within the restoration effort, known as the institution of the reserve a “good jumping point” for future conservation motion within the Caribbean, which is peppered with small islands overrun by invasive species.
“What we’re hoping to see is that we’ll be able to use the same model of NGOs working with government, working with private individuals and private agencies to come up with a system of managing an area,” Hill advised Mongabay.
Removing invasive species has additionally been carried out to revive islands in lots of different elements of the world, together with French Polynesia, Tonga and South Africa. The effectiveness of this restoration technique can also be supported by science. A 2022 research discovered that eradicating invasive species, resembling rats, rabbits, cats and pigs, was 88% efficient in restoring biodiversity on island habitats.
Daltry mentioned she expects extra constructive modifications on Redonda and its surrounding sea within the coming a long time.
“Without vegetation, things were just crumbling into the sea, smashing up the reefs and the seagrass meadows,” Daltry mentioned. “But we should always see that stress lower on the coral reefs and the seagrass meadows to begin to recuperate as properly.
“When you remove rats on an island, seabird populations recover, and indeed, we can already see the seabird populations increasing,” Daltry added. “And there’s very close connections between the state of the seabirds and the state of fish.”
Hill mentioned essentially the most thrilling half about Redonda’s restoration and institution as a protected space is seeing “Antiguans and Barbudans fall in love with Redonda and be at the forefront of conservation action.”
“Antigua and Barbuda has not always been at the front and center [of conservation], and it’s not a picture that we’ve grown up seeing,” Hill mentioned. “And I’m so excited and so proud of my team of people who are Antiguans and Barbudans.”
Banner picture: Seabirds on Redonda Island cliffs. Image © Ed Marshall / Fauna & Flora.
Elizabeth Claire Alberts is a senior workers author for Mongabay. Follow her on Twitter @ECAlberts.
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Citation:
Spatz, D. R., Holmes, N. D., Will, D. J., Hein, S., Carter, Z. T., Fewster, R. M., … Russell, J. C. (2022). The world contribution of invasive vertebrate eradication as a key island restoration device. Scientific Reports, 12(1). doi:10.1038/s41598-022-14982-5
