Durrell's big plans to bring people closer to their animals

Friday 30 December 2016

Durrell has big plans to bring people closer to the animals in 2017.

The new CEO says despite suffering from a decline in tourism that has been seen across the Island, the charity is working hard to improve the visitor experience and some of the animals' exhibits.

Dr Leslie Dickie only took up the post in October but was soon off to some big award ceremonies.

(Durrell's new CEO Dr Leslie Dickie)

She said: "It's a fantastic job, I have to pinch myself sitting at my desk sometimes!

"In 2016 we won three very large prizes, the big one, our Chief Scientist Professor Carl Jones won the Indianapolis, the Conservation Nobel prize, he was awarded that in October, which I went to and Lee Durrell went to, which was absolutely fantastic, Signourney Weaver was there and it was all in recognition of Carl's work particularly in Mauritius, saving species from extinction.

"In the same week in Mexico, in Puebla, I attended the World Association of Zoos and Aquarias. They now give a conservation prize and we were the first recipient, I think because of the long history of our work, it's the length of time that Durrell has been doing it and the fact that Durrell were the forerunners in Zoos getting involved in conservation, now they are a massive support to conservation. I think it was recognition of that longevity as our projects are very long term. Conservation has to be long term for it to work.

"The other prize was completely different, we won the AA 2017 Glamping Site of the Year Award, we were up against hundreds of glamping sites across the UK. Obviously we want people to come to Durrell but we want to encourage people to come to the Island as a whole and offer a different kind of experience as well.

"We've suffered from the decline in Tourism as the whole island has, and I hope that things like our glamping site is us doing our bit in helping to bring people to the Island. We're looking at how we are marketing ourselves. People are coming for a day out, time with their families, coming for fun, but hopefully they can leave knowing a bit about what we do. 

"We had pretty much the same visitor numbers (in 2016) as the year before but financially we're made a bit more progress this year and hopefully we'll make more progress next year."

The team at Durrell are now busy planning for the year ahead.

Dr Dickie said: "In terms of the zoo site, we have a couple of projects, we are doubling the size of our bat exhibit. I think the bat exhibit is probably already the best in Europe but what we want to do is give them as much opportunity for flying, the big Livingstone bats can fly in a straight line at the moment but we're doubling the enclosure in size so that they can fly continuously, and do more acrobatics and we hope to have that exhibit ready by early Summer."

"We had a very generous donation from Elaine and Chris Fairfax, you'll remember her as she was the lady who phoned up Chris Evans, to help Children in Need. Elaine has given us £100,000 and we really appreciate her generosity.

"I think our bats are already among the fittest that there are around and we hope to have that exhibit ready by early Summer."

Mammal Keeper Edward Bell said: "Extending our bat enclosure is going to make a huge difference for the Livingstone's and Rodrigues fruit bats at Durrell, both of which are critically endangered in the wild. By expanding the width of the tunnel, the bats will have more of an opportunity to fly continuously around the enclosure. This will improve their overall health and fitness, as well as allowing more research to be carried out.

"Here at Durrell we are continuously studying the species in our care and this extension will increase and diversify the studies that can be carried out to further improve our understanding of the species, both here at the 'Island Bat Roost" and in their native home, the Comoros Islands."

Dr Dickie said: "The other thing we are hopefully going to be doing is making a new tamarin range, we want to start exhibiting them in a slightly different way. We are looking at re-doing our tamarin ranges and giving them a better range, sometimes it gets difficult to see them. It will have a mix of different tamarins, the pied tamarins, the black lion tamarins.

"We're planning on lots of different things, and we've been looking at how we could enhance the visitor experience, putting in new things for them."

Dr Dickie says the team want to make sure something is always going on and are planning a number of events in the Summer as well as 'Boo at the Zoo' for Halloween and an even bigger Christmas event in 2017.

Meanwhile out in the field Durrell will be continuing the work they are doing as well as looking at new places where they can help wildlife.

Dr Dickie said: "A lot of institutions do different projects but part of our ethos is to stick with the projects we're already doing, long term. We can show it works, we have a performance measure, the Durrell Index and I think we're the only conservation place that can show that progress so clearly.

"We're looknig at South East Asia as a possible new place, there is a lot of impact on wildlife there. We're considering should we do more there. We're also doing work in the Caribbean."

Dr Dickie said one of the highlights of 2016 was an evening with Sir David Attenborough who is an honorary fellow of Durrell and believes that his Planet Earth II series has got more young people passionate about conservation.

"I think what he does is get people talking about wildlife on a Monday morning, more young people were watching Planet Earth than X Factor and that gives me hope that the natural world is still an amazing draw for people.

"One thing we really want to do is to bring people closer to the animals so that they get a much more intimate experience of the animals so we'll be looking at that."

Here are some of the Keepers' highlights of 2016:

Head of the Bird Department Dr H Glyn Young said: "It has been a momentous year for the choughs in Jersey and a big step forward for the Birds on the Edge project. In 2015, we had the successful fledging of Dusty, the first wild-hatched chough in over 100 years and 2016 has brought even more success with 35 choughs now flying free at Sorel, four of which hatched in the wild this year.

Senior Mammal Keeper Jenna Hunt said: "In January this year, we were over the moon when Bahia gave birth to her first infant, Raymi, as he was the first Andean bear cub to be born at Durrell in 20 years. This year we've watched him grow into a very independent and playful young bear. He's really boisterous just like his dad, Quechua, and spends lots of time running around the dens and climbing right to the top of the trees outside."

Senior Mammal Keeper Rachel Cowen said: "We were overjoyed when Ala the aye-aye gave birth to her first infant in June this year. This was a very important baby for the European aye-aye studbook, as neither of its parents had ever bred before. We've named the aye-aye Matoky, which means hope in Malagasy. We thought it was apt as Matoky not only unites genes from the captive aye-aye collections in Japan and North America for the first time in the European population, but was also our first aye-aye birth at Durrell in 13 years."