The Last Survivors

As 2011 lies ahead of us I feel like its time to reflect on our work over the last twelve months. 2010 has without a doubt been an extremely productive and I would say successful year and it has laid a solid foundation for the work that lies ahead. Some of our achievements would not have been possible without the help of the people that joined the last survivors team at different stages throughout 2010, particular thank you goes to Rebecca Morelle and Simon Hancock from the BBC, Cristina Secades from Imperial college and Rebecca Coe from London Zoo. All helped with different aspects of the project, namely raising public awareness, carrying out a social study and educational work respectively. Other people have also helped us tremendously throughout the year including Jose Rafael Paula Rosa (Journalist), Santiago Munoz (Servicio Geologico Nacional), Jake Kheel (Punta Cana Foundation) and Ivelisse Diaz Sosa (Head of the educational department at the national zoo). Also have a look at the “supporting organisations” part of the website to get an idea of the wide cross section of organisations that have engaged with the project. Not everyone who has helped is listed as yet and it’s worth highlighting the help we have received from the British Embassy in the Dominican Republic, particularly the ambassador Steve Fisher, Denise Ruiz and Scott Melling.

Part of the team back in May

On the scientific survey front we have covered an incredible amount of ground thanks to the hard work of the whole team. I have no idea of how many kilometres we have trekked over the last year but it must be well over 1000. In December alone we walked over 90Km in Jaragua National Park (something those of you following us on facebook and/or twitter will know all about).

Parque Jaragua Forest

We have carried out standardised surveys in 181 randomly selected sites whilst along the way we have seen signs of solenodon and/or hutia in 358 different places across three national parks (have a look at the maps). It’s sad to think that Nicolas and Lleyo who helped us so much with our achievements have decided to move on, both for very different reasons. Nicolas because there was an increasing demand by photographers to help with their work and because of his responsibilities in caring for his families agricultural land. Lleyo on the other hand left because he found the on going field work quite physically demanding which it undoubtedly is. I have no doubt that he will be working with us when we need him in the future. Nicolas and Lleyos gift to the project was to train Ramon Espinal (“Moncho”) in their skills. Moncho has picked up the necessary skills very quickly and is already building on his knowledge. He is proving to be quite an amazing all rounder which means that with his energy and enthusiasm we should make just as much or more progress over the next 12 months.

Moncho pointing out a nose poke (left) and working out a route through the forest

Ros Kennerly (Reading University) will be joining us in the Dominican Republic in February to start her PhD research looking at how our two species use both natural and human altered landscapes. We will undoubtedly have many other visitors contributing to our work and we are looking forward to working with them all. We will be launching the infomercials produced by Daniela Rusowsky (Funk Productions) and the Spanish version of the website sometime in early 2011 we hope. The website is being translated thanks to the incredible hard work of our team of volunteer translators: Alejandra Oliver, Leah Berry and Desy Guerrero.

Seasonal greetings to all our supporters

Lastly it just remains for me to thank you all for your continued support. Stick with us and watch as we progress with the plight of the Hispaniolan solenodon and hutia. Best wishes to you all for 2011.

It’s hard to believe but the project has been running for just over a year.  For us this year has flown by and we have achieved a lot in that time thanks to the efforts of everyone who has been involved. The British ambassador, Steven Fisher, kindly hosted a reception at his official residence in Santo Domingo to mark the first anniversary as part of the International year of Biodiversity. The reception was attended by a wide range of people across government, private business and many other different organisations/institutions. As part of the reception celebrations we put on a photo exhibition of the fauna of Hispaniola which then moved on to the festival of plants and flowers at the Dominican Republic (DR) botanical gardens and is now located at the Dominican Republic museum of natural history until the end of the year.

Jorge Brocca (SOH), Steven Fisher (HM Ambassador) & Joe Nunez (Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust) (Photo credit: Denise Ruiz)

Photo Exhibition at Botanical Gardens (Photo: Joe Nunez) and Museum of Natural History (Photo: Yurkidia Díaz)

The team was asked to take part in the national red list review workshop as well as a conservation planning workshop for two endangered bird species (Bicknell’s thrush and the black-capped petrel). Both of these meetings were a great opportunity to meet other people working in conservation across Hispaniola (Haiti and DR) and the whole of the Caribbean. The threats faced by many of the species that we are all working on are very similar (primarily alien species and habitat destruction) so it was great to be able to discuss how we can work together in order to achieve our conservation goals more effectively.

Field work has been progressing at an ever increasing rate and we have surveyed for solenodon and hutia in some very remote areas within Del Este and Jaragua national parks. It has been tough going at times but our team effort has helped us to overcome the challenges we faced time and again. We have seen signs of both species in various different places and we will soon be putting our first models together that will give us an initial idea of the likely distribution of both species across the island.

View across Jaragua national park (Photo: Joe Nunez)

The education department at the national zoo has continued to give talks about solenodon and hutia to schools visiting the national zoo and we have also run a number of successful training courses not just for our research assistants but also for members of staff at the national zoo as well as guides working in different parts of the country.

Joe Nunez and students at Punta Cana GIS, maps and expedition planning training course (Photo: Jose Rivas)

There is still a lot of work to be done so the next twelve months will undoubtedly be just as busy as the last twelve: Ros Kennerly (previous blog) will be joining us in the field early in 2011, we will work more widely across the whole island and increase our training/capacity building efforts.

We also need to re-double our education/outreach work in order to continue to reach as wide an audience as possible. During my last trip into the field an angry villager suggested that solenodon were eating his bean crop and threatened to kill them. He had seen nose pokes in the area where something had eaten through some of his bean plants; he assumed one thing was linked to the other. I had to explain that solenodon would not eat through any crop and on examination of the plants I thought the likely culprits were rats which are very abundant in the area.

There will be another update before the year is up but as always you can get more regular updates on our facebook page and on twitter (@solenodon_joe).

Ros Kennerley

I am very excited about my first visit to the Dominican Republic, which will happen in early February. I am looking forward to learning all about The Last Survivors project and getting up to speed with all the progress made so far and the techniques that they have already developed. The first field season for me will last for four or five months, and for the first couple of weeks of this I will be accompanied by Dr Malcolm Nicoll and Dr Simon Butler, two of my PhD supervisors at Reading University. We plan to use this initial period to gain an understanding of the different types of land use within the country and the potential study areas available for me to use, and hopefully have an opportunity to catch and handle some animals.

I am a conservation biologist and have conducted fieldwork and managed projects on mammals and birds both in the UK and overseas. I have been fortunate enough to have studied several highly endangered species for high profile conservation programmes, for example working for the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation (MWF) on the recovery of the echo parakeet and the pink pigeon, two projects which have also received support from Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust. I have worked in the Caribbean before, where I studied nest-site selection in the Bahama Parrot on Great Inagua, Bahamas. Prior to starting this PhD at Reading University, I worked as an ecologist for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) for three years, gaining valuable experience working with other NGOs, different funding bodies, training volunteers and staff, and presenting findings and advice to a wide range of audiences.

I am thrilled to have this unique opportunity to work with solenodon and hutia, because although I have experience of monitoring, live trapping and radiotracking various mammals, the main focus of this work has been in studying the negative impacts that native and invasive mammals can have on vulnerable bird populations. However, here I will be aiding the conservation of the mammal species themselves. There has been limited study on these two species to date; therefore, there is much to learn, even about aspects of their basic ecology. As there are so many unknowns, my first field season will be quite exploratory, developing an understanding of the methods that will be most suitable for studying the two species, and testing specialist equipment that should give me an insight into how far the animals move and how they use different habitats. So there is much to learn and much to look forward to.

One of the main themes that we have been focusing on since our last blog has been education. We recognize just how crucial it is to make as many people as possible aware of these two species, their habitats and our conservation efforts. This is particularly true for the younger generation. We have been very fortunate to have Dr Rebecca Coe from London Zoo education department join the project for three weeks to help us in our efforts. Her visit to the project has been a huge success but I will leave it to her to tell you all about it. There will be another blog update soon since there is so much else to tell you about in terms of our field work and all the other work we have been doing.

Becky Coe with “Soli”, emblem for ZooDom

Hello! My name is Dr Becky Coe, I have been working for ZSL London Zoo as an Education Officer for the past three and a half years – and finally seized an opportunity to visit a field-based conservation project.  Thanks to ZSL’s Michael Brambell Travel Award I was able to spend three weeks in the Dominican Republic assisting on “The Last Survivors” project.

It was an excellent introduction into the multi-faceted nature of conservation work. Obviously I knew it wasn’t just a case of putting a fence round some furry little critters and sitting back to let them get on with it, but I perhaps wasn’t aware of how difficult it is to strike a balance, of how many activities compete for your time – and energy – and how gently you must sometimes tread. I must add here that the Project Managers of “The Last Survivors” are doing an extremely admirable job. From imaginative ideas of engaging local business people to ensuring in-country research assistants are trained in field techniques; from fund raising to talking to schools; from investigating the attitude of people in direct contact with an endangered species to finding time to actually study the species itself.

I was primarily in the Dominican Republic to apply my background in Education to raising awareness for the solenodon and hutia. Sadly, Communication, Education, Participation and Awareness (“CEPA”) is sometimes a “poor cousin” in the world of conservation, added on to projects as a bit of an after-thought. But for the long term survival of a species what could be more important than letting the people who share their space know about them and their precarious existence? Why else should they care? Why should they support, financially or otherwise, protection of something they don’t know about?

From what I have seen on the project, in this instance simple awareness-raising is the place to start. Mention a solenodon or a hutia and you tend to be met with a blank look, so people cannot begin to know that their island is home to two unique terrestrial mammals found nowhere else in the world (not to mention various endemic birds, beetles, frogs and plants). To start to tackle this,  I , Joe Nunez-Mino (my glamorous assistant and translator) and Jorge Brocca spoke to seven school groups, three universities, the staff of ZooDom (the National Zoo in Santo Domingo) and even to an audience of three in the Park Guard’s hut on Isla Catalina. We variously spoke about the solenodon and hutia, demonstrated field techniques, and discussed the role of a modern zoo.

A very attentive audience in the Park Guard’s house on Isla Catalina

Children learn how camera traps work and get to be solenodons

These presentations also gave the opportunity for Ivelisse Diaz Sosa, Director of Education at ZooDom, and her team the chance to observe some techniques for engaging different audiences. Ivelisse has lots of ideas, and boundless enthusiasm, for incorporating solenodons (incidentally, the logo of ZooDom) into their education program, so in the longer term awareness-raising will continue. There is also a need for more targeted communication, creating a dialogue with the people who come in direct contact with “The Last Survivors”. Finding out, for example, why villagers’ dogs are allowed off the leash at night (when they have been known to attack solenodons and hutias) and how the villagers can be encouraged to change this behaviour. Hopefully another volunteer/intern Carmen Aurora Suriel-Melchor will be able to get the ball rolling on this, building also on the interviews carried out by Cristina Fernandez Secades (both of whom have the distinct advantage over me of actually speaking Spanish!).

Something else I was really glad to be involved in was a spot of field work, something I haven’t had a chance to do since my PhD. The pictures of Isla Catalina don’t do it justice; it was genuinely hard work! It was hot, sweaty and a personal cloud of mosquitoes were our constant companions. We collected camera traps from a previous expedition, set new ones and saw some possible signs of solenodons’ presence – all the time accompanied by the irrepressible research assistants Lleyo and Moncho. We returned to the promising areas and spent a brilliant few hours in the forest by night. My previous study species (with the possible exception of teenagers) have always been diurnal, and I wasn’t really prepared for how amazing the forest is after dark. We’re such visual creatures that, once the torches go off, the other senses are forced out of their slumber and you become aware of how alive the forest is: the snap, crackle and pop voiced by unknown forest inhabitants; the delicate, if slightly unnerving, feeling of a drowsy butterfly landing on your face and always the pounding of heart and heaving of breath as you strain to hear something which may or may not be there. And it seemed this time the solenodons were not. To be fair, it would not be far short of miraculous if they had survived on a small island populated by alien introductions such as racoons, rats, cats and bizarrely, until quite recently, spider monkeys.

Picture postcard perfect Isla Catalina – but postcards don’t tell you about the mozzies which we had to continually brush off by flagellating ourselves with a branch

Someone also had to check for the presence of solenodons in the luxurious tourist resort of Punta Cana, I felt like I was just the girl for the job! Sadly, despite some likely looking caves, the camera traps didn’t pick up anything here either. However, I was able to see one of the most endangered birds of prey in the wild, the stunning Ridgeway Hawk; hold a hatchling Hawksbill turtle; have my feet cleaned by shrimps …and did I mention the beautiful beaches? The visit also ended with the dubious honour of sharing the car ride back to Santo Domingo with the “interesting” deceased hutia mentioned by Joe on twitter, interesting is not the adjective I would ascribe to its perfume.

Ridgeway Hawk

My visit attracted some press interest, where I was touted as the “British Expert”, although Google translations left me a little unsure of what I was expert in. It did also lead to one of the most surreal experiences of my life. Imagine being ushered into a fake, air conditioned rainforest (metres away from the real thing), with people speaking an alien language to you, being handed a microphone and told “give your message of hope for the future of conservation” on LIVE TV! Fortunately, I doubt anyone I know will ever see that broadcast, although I’m sure I said something terribly profound (just hope Joe translated it correctly!).

It was a brilliant trip and although I never saw a wild solenodon or hutia, I am confident they are being well looked after and one day I hope to come back and visit them.
My visit attracted some press interest, where I was touted as the “British Expert”, although Google translations left me a little unsure of what I was expert in. It did also lead to one of the most surreal experiences of my life. Imagine being ushered into a fake, air conditioned rainforest (metres away from the real thing), with people speaking an alien language to you, being handed a microphone and told “give your message of hope for the future of conservation” on LIVE TV! Fortunately, I doubt anyone I know will ever see that broadcast, although I’m sure I said something terribly profound (just hope Joe translated it correctly!).

It was a brilliant trip and although I never saw a wild solenodon or hutia, I am confident they are being well looked after and one day I hope to come back and visit them.

Joe Nunez-Mino: An update on all our activities is long overdue, apologies to everyone following our progress. While I have been away in the UK, Pedro has been kept pretty busy here in the Dominican Republic exploring some new areas (something you can read about further down). While on the subject of exploring new areas, the project has now obtained permits to continue doing research at the nationwide level rather than being restricted to three of the national parks (which was the situation up until now) thanks to the support of the ministry for the environment and natural resources. 

While I was in the UK we held a very successful event at the London Apothecary Centre which consisted of a series of talks and accompanying photo exhibition. We managed to raise over £1000 for the project and also raised awareness of the project at several levels. We had visitors from the Dominican Republic Ministry of Tourism in addition to representatives from the Dominican Republic London Embassy including his Excellency the ambassador Anibal de Castro. All were very encouraging and pledged their support for the project.

Lots of people gave their time and effort to make this exhibition work. A big thank you to Rosey Grandage of the London Apothecary Centre for organising and coordinating the exhibition. Susan Griggs for curating the exhibition and Indusphoto for printing all the photographs. Our deepest gratitude goes to the fantastic photographers who donated their incredible work to the cause: Leandro Pichardo, Fer Figheras, Fausto Ortiz, Rafael Arvelo, Jerry Bauer, Rafael Bello Camacho, Leo Salazar, Felix Sepulveda, Jose Alejandro Alvarez, Pedro Genaro Rodriguez, Francisco Salgero & Fonso Khouri

His Excellency Anibal de Castro and Marlen Vasquez (Photo: Caroline Forbes)

We hope to hold similar events in the future both in the Dominican Republic and the UK. In fact, plans are developing to hold a reception in the Dominican Republic to celebrate the first year of the project as part of the International Year of Biodiversity in October. The UK ambassador to the Dominican Republic, his Excellency Steven Mark Fisher, is to host the event at his residency in Santo Domingo. Further support for the event has also been pledged by the director of the Dominican Republic national zoo, Dr Patricia Toribio.

Let me hand you over to Pedro

Pedro Marinez: This time it is my intention try to draw a field report of the crew activities during late June through to July which is the time that Joe was taking his vacation back in the UK. We had a first trip to Parque del Este during this time and set our camp in Boca de Yuma. We soon realised that staying there was a matter of life and death. After almost being eaten alive by a plague of mosquitoes, we decided to move the camp to Guaraguao another one of the park’s cabins in the Bayahibe area. There things went a little bit better although we did not escape the merciless mosquito attack completely but, at least we had electricity and water.   

Honestly, not all was that bad during this trip. We found in some areas of the park what we think could be very different evidence from what we have been seeing in the other two parks where we have been working (Parque Jaragua and Parque Sierra de Bahoruco). We definitely need some more conclusive evidence but at the same time the idea that we have encountered something different is very exciting to us.

From Parque del Este we moved to Parque Jaragua where little work had been done there. Parque Jaragua is a different kind of environment, a very dry type of forest with lot of cactus and a tree called Guao, that no matter how far you pass them, you have the feeling that a nest of Amazonian killing ants is heaven.

I hope the next issue brings even better news.

Joe Nunez-Mino: shortly after my return to the Dominican Republic we decided to launch into the field which is where I am writing to you from right now. At the moment I am in very comfortable Punta Cana where we are looking to confirm the presence of solenodon. We have strong evidence that they are here but it is not yet conclusive – camera traps have been strategically placed and the next few days will be crucial. By the way, we have officially launched our twitter site – http://twitter.com/solenodon_joe which we will update whenever and wherever we have a phone signal. This will give a blow by blow of what the team is up to.

The first five days in the field were spent in Parque del Este where we explored very remote areas in the southern part of the park which can be accessed by boat although this is expensive and our budget does not quite stretch to it. Instead we took the much harder route by foot. It involved six hour treks through blistering hot sun and although mosquitoes and sand flies were a problem they were no where near as unbearable as the previous trip that Pedro took to this area. The park hut that we stayed in, Las Palmillas, is right next door to a very popular tourist site. Tourists are shipped in daily in a variety of boats in order to dine on Lobster. The beaches are spectacular in the area, the forest equally so.

A local park guard accompanied us in our surveys in order to become acquainted and trained in the survey methods we use. We found further ‘different’ evidence just like Pedro and the team had discovered further north although we still don’t have anything conclusive. We will continue our quest to establish the whys and why not’s of the evidence we are finding in this region of the country.

Other news includes the fact that the project has now been listed on the website for the British Chamber of Commerce for the Dominican Republic. Although not directly connected to the project its great to report the fact that the Dominican Republic has now released a stamp with a solenodon on it.

Dr Rebecca Coe who is an educational officer from London Zoo will be arriving in the Dominican Republic next week to work along side Ivelisse Diaz Sosa who heads up the educational department at the national zoo. Jointly they will further develop the educational program that will aim to increase the knowledge and awareness of solenodon and hutia amongst school children at the nation wide level.

We hope not to take so long before the next update but remember you can always follow our progress on facebook or for more regular updates on twitter .

I don’t know how but the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) figured out that it is my birthday today (17^th June) and I suspect thats why they decided to make the solenodon the “Species of the day” today. Its all part of the IUCN involvement with the “International Year of Biodiversity” so please do check out and download the information which is available from: http://www.iucnredlist.org/species-of-the-day (If your reading this after the 17^th of June then go to http://www.iucnredlist.org/sotdfiles/solenodon-paradoxus.pdf). The whole of the last survivor’s team feel extremely privileged to have one of our species honoured in this way.

Click the photo do download the pdf

I’m off back to the UK for a while for mostly a holiday although I will also be doing a series of talks along with Sam Turvey during an exhibition of incredible images by some outstanding photographers from the Dominican Republic who have kindly donated their work (which will be on sale) to the project. It’s all part of our celebration of international year of biodiversity. For more information about the event in July go to http://www.cbd.int/2010/country/?country=gb and to book tickets go to http://www.londonapothecary.co.uk/special.php

 The BBC coverage we have had this month has been truly amazing and has brought the work we are doing into the limelight. We cannot thank Rebecca Morelle and Simon Hancock from the BBC enough for all the hard work that they put into this. They are now officially honorary members of “The Last Survivors” team for life.

The Last survivors Team including honorary members from the BBC

 I mentioned in my blog in May that the rainy season appeared to be late this year but it has now arrived in earnest. It delayed some of our field work for a bit but Pedro managed to get out last week into Bahoruco to look for evidence of our two species in some tough to get to sites. Despite getting soaked for two days in a row they managed to get all the work done. While they were in the field they came across the remains of a solenodon, unfortunately it was mostly just bones so it is difficult if not impossible to figure out exactly what the cause of death was. There are quite a few to choose from unfortunately, dogs or poison to name two. Of course it may have been an entirely natural death – lets hope so!

One of the project partners, Dominican Republic National Zoo (ZOODOM) has had visitors from the UK. Namely Pam Broughton from the North Wales Bird Trust who runs a collaborative project doing research and trying to conserve the Ashy faced Owl (Tyto glaucops). This stunning bird is yet another of the amazing species that is only found on this Island. Since her return to the UK she has been spreading the word of our work while we in turn have promised to keep an eye out for any signs of all five owl species found here while we are out in the field. Potentially some of these owl species could be natural predators of solenodon!. Pam has also managed to do some fund raising for us, thanks!!!.

Photo by Pam Broughton, North Wales Bird Trust. Click on the photo to go to the trusts site

Cristina, who I told you about in my last blog, has done some amazing work while she has been out here with us. She has managed to interview about 250 people across nine communities near one of the national parks in just under two months. Her contribution to the project in terms of giving us some sturdy base line data on the level of awareness and perception of the two species will prove very valuable indeed.

We have continued to forge away in our efforts to form links with a variety of research and educational institutions in the Dominican Republic. These should be formalised over the coming weeks and will give us a base from which to make sure that the benefits of our work reach as wide an audience as possible. On that note, we will be joined by Rebecca Coe who is an educational officer from London Zoo for three weeks in August. We are looking forward to Rebeccas arrival already, she will be advising and guiding our educational program aimed at kids and young adults.

Right, I’m off to pack but I’ll leave you in the very capable hands of Pedro and the rest of the team. I doubt I’ll be missed at all although I am already looking forward to returning in July to find out what has been going. I’ll no doubt not be able to resist check in on the blog to find out!

We were not expecting to write another blog until mid June but there is lots of exciting news that we want to share with you and so it warrants this special edition blog.

Joe Nunez-Mino will be back in the UK in July and will be giving a series talks along with Dr Sam Turvey. The Apothecary centre, where the talks are being held, will also be hosting an exhibition with a selection of photos from some very talented Dominican Republic photographers. These photos will not simply be about solenodon and hutia but also include photos of some of the other unique fauna and flora of the island along with photos of people and landscapes. The event is ticketed and photos will also be on sale with all proceeds benefiting the conservation project. For further details of the event and how you can get tickets please go to: http://www.londonapothecary.co.uk/special.php

Cristina Fernandez Secades, a student from Imperial College, has joined the project. She has hit the ground running and has already had a very productive time interviewing people in villages located near one of the national parks. The Masters project she is carrying out has two main objectives: 1) to establish the level of predation that solenodon and hutia are suffering because of wild and domestic dogs 2) finding out the tolerance of people to damage of crops/livestock from both endemic and introduced species before a response is triggered, in addition to assessing the type of response created (e.g. poison, traps, hunting, etc).

Cristina interviewing close to the Haitian border.

Arguably the most exciting news is that we have had a BBC reporter and cameraman accompany us for a week while we were carrying out field work. Their time out here coincided with a visit from Dr. Sam Turvey (Zoological Society of London; EDGE) and Dr. Richard Young (Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust) which meant the BBC were able to get the whole “Last Survivors” team in action.

The first report, entitled “Ghost hunters: On the trail of a ‘living fossil” is available on line from the BBC website: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10146397.stm

You can watch the second report, entitled “The cave of bones: A story of solenodon survival” at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10147688.stm 

The final and possibly most exciting report is “Close encounter with a bizarre venomous beast” at:  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10149148.stm

There has also been a series of radio and TV reports across various BBC radio and TV news programs on the 2nd of June.

The team seemed to cause some local interest

You may have noticed the next bit of news already, namely the fact that the project now has its own logo. This eye catching logo was designed and donated by Ivan Mota from “Unknown” (http://ivanmotart.blogspot.com/). We hope you love the logo as much as we do. This image will be representing us and will be used in all the material we produce in order to educate people and increase awareness of the endangered mammal species of the Caribbean.

New Project logo

We have made a major update on the website to enable all of you to track our progress on establishing the past and current distribution of the Hispaniolan solenodon and hutia. You can check out the map as it currently stands at http://www.thelastsurvivors.org/the-project/species-distribution-maps/ Don’t forget that this is a dynamic map that will be regularly updated so keep coming back to it to see where we have managed to find signs or even seen our two secretive mammals.

One bit of news from the field work that we’d like to share with you is the fact that this week we got a report of a solenodon family that had been cornered by dogs and captured by local villagers. Luckily, we were contacted on this occasion and after rushing to get to the remote area where the solenodon were, we were able to ensure their prompt release after checking that they were in good condition and had no injuries that may have impacted on their chances of surviving. The project will continue to try and make more people aware of these mammals at the same time as we learn more about them in order to reduce these sorts of incidents from occurring.

Solenodon family pre release

Another update coming soon with more details about the BBC visit along with Sam and Richards’s time in the Dominican Republic.

Back in the UK you have been experiencing the arrival of spring, here on the Island of Hispaniola we are still waiting for our next season to start in earnest – namely the rainy season. The island is currently experiencing a bit of a drought and although this is not a good thing in general, it has meant that we have managed to avoid any major soakings since our last update. That’s not to say that no rain has fallen, it just means we have not been caught out in the field when it has. However, instead we have had to cope with searing hot temperatures in order to look for solenodon and hutia in remote sites which can only be accessed via very long treks through areas of dry forest with little or no shade. Its been tough going!!

Luckily for the Dominican Republic and unlike its neighbour Haiti, a lot of its land is still covered in forest which has allowed it to withstand the worst effects of the current drought relatively well. The main area where we have been working since our last update is the north of sierra de Bahoruco national park where it seems that since the creation of the park there has been some natural regeneration of the forest in what was previously agricultural land. Happily we found lots of signs of solenodon in the area and we managed to capture two individuals in order to take genetic samples. Unfortunately we did not encounter any hutia populations. While working in this area we were very lucky to be able to stay in a small community called Puerto Escondido at the Tody Tours campsite (http://www.todytours.com) which is owned by Kate Wallace. Kate and her bird touring company is yet another organisation that has leant its support to the project, something we are particularly grateful for since it meant we were staying in relatively luxurious comfort after our very long sweaty treks into the surrounding forest.

Solenodon have been in the national press over the last few weeks since at least two individuals were caught by local villagers in an area that was being cleared for agriculture. This area, named Hato Mayor, is in the east of the island and is the same area where a farmer caught a couple of solenodon 44 years ago, causing a lot of debate in the national newspapers back then. There is some cringe worthy TV footage of one of the animals caught recently which you can watch at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sWkf3rDOGo. Sadly these animals were caught during the day (remember they are strictly nocturnal!) as they searched for a new home after their habitat was destroyed. One animal was later released while another was taken to the National Zoo (one of the project collaborators) to be taken care of while a new location for it to be released into is found. The Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources has called for a halt to any further land conversion in the area until the status of the solenodon community is established. We held a press conference in order to lend our support to the ministry and to inform the wider public of how solenodon are fairing in areas where forest is being allowed to return and in other areas where its being cut down – this all reflects the very mixed picture for solenodon across this large Caribbean Island.

 We have been holding a series of talks for kids aged between 4 and 14 at the Kids Museum (http://www.trampolin.org.do/) in Santo Domingo, the capital city of Dominican Republic. Kids from all over the country came to the talks and it was interesting to see how few of them (less than 1 in 10 on average) knew about their last two endemic non flying land mammals. They were all fascinated to find out about them and their obvious pride in them was easy to see. Hopefully it will inspire some of them to take an active role in conservation in the future.

The international press have continued to show a lot of interest in the project and we did a couple days of filming with a Brazilian TV programme called “Wild Adventure” (http://www.sbt.com.br/aventuraselvagem/). An hour long programme about the project will be televised later on this year in one of the most widely viewed wildlife programmes in Brazil.

On a completely unrelated front, we are in the grips of election madness here in the Dominican Republic with a major congressional election happening ten days after the one in the UK. The whole country will be electing 32 senators and 178 local representatives. Every road and village is covered in all the different flags representing the various parties, its definitely making the whole place very colourful and interesting to drive through as we travel to our field sites.

Thanks from all “the last survivors” team for your support and encouragement. Don’t forget to get in touch with any questions or comments.

JOE NUNEZ: As always, we have been pretty busy since our last blog posting. Pedro will tell you all about our latest rounds of field work but first I want to take the opportunity to update you on other fronts.

 We have had our first training session over Skype with Daniela Rusowsky (www.funkproductions.wordpress.com) who is teaching all of us how to use a camcorder effectively in order to produce a series of infomercial films targeted at various audiences (kids, teenagers, organizations and for the international community). We have all had a bit of practice with the camera now and are having a good laugh filming each other, will let you know how this progresses. A series of PowerPoint presentations have also now been created for the educational department at the national zoo which is a great opportunity to let more people, particularly young people, know about these remarkable mammals.

The number of individuals and organisations which are showing an interest on the work we are carrying out is growing steadily. We are really keen to get as many of these to participate actively. It will be an ongoing process since they will be crucial in order to create a sustainable long term project. Particular thanks has got to go to ecological foundation of Punta Cana (http://www.puntacana.com/) for allowing us access to their land as well as covering the cost of our food and lodging while working there. We have also had support from The Nature Conservancy (http://www.nature.org/) and the National Geological Survey (http://www.dgm.gov.do/sdgeologia/) in the form of GIS layers (basically different types of electronic maps). These maps have already proven really helpful in planning our research and will be crucial later on in the project in order to analyse our results and come up with some management and monitoring suggestions. 

By Jose Nunez-Mino

I simply can’t write this blog without mentioning the devastating earthquake that hit Hispaniola on the 12 of January 2010; it was felt throughout the island although its destructive impact was concentrated on the Haitian capital (Port-Au-Prince). I was in the capital of the Dominican Republic (Santo Domingo) at the time and we felt it there too; some people in Santo Domingo ran out of and away from buildings in fear. In terms of the project, this natural disaster is likely to have a real impact in the future. Thousands of people have lost everything and many have been displaced. In the short term, the immediate humanitarian need obviously takes precedence. However, I hope that in the long term the environmental/conservation aspect is taken into account as part of Haiti’s recovery plan.

The field work has kicked off in earnest since my last blog and there has been a lot of research activity despite the fact that I spent two weeks back in the UK since then, most of this progress can be credited to our genius research assistants Nicholas and Lleyo. Not only have they surveyed some extensive areas but they have managed to get even more great video footage of solenodon and hutia in the wild. Our library of DNA samples from hutia and solenodon is also growing steadily. Unfortunately, two lots of samples have come from animals that were found dead, one in the east of the island killed by dogs and one we found in the south west of the island which died of unknown causes but possibly poisoned. Nicolas and Lleyos trapping abilities have become increasingly refined so we have managed to collect most of our samples far less destructively with their help. In the future, these samples which are being analysed by a team led by Dr Sam Turvey at the Zoological Society of London (London Zoo) will establish just how genetically separated different populations of the species are.

A Hispaniolan solenodon photographed on a recent field trip

The other exciting news is that our team is now complete since a local counterpart field project manager has been appointed. I’d like to take this opportunity to welcome and introduce you to Pedro Martinez our newest team member. Pedro is a Dominican Republic national and comes with a wealth of experience after working for several conservation organisations over a number of years. I’m sure his extensive expertise combined with his local knowledge will strengthen our team even further. You will get to know him better over the coming months as he starts to contribute to these blogs.

I’m afraid I dropped Pedro in the deep end as his first expedition into the field as part of the project started on his third day of work when we ventured into Parque Jaragua to do our first extensive survey in the dry cactus forest. It was tough going with extremely spiny cactus surrounding us all the time and razor sharp limestone under foot, Pedro appeared to take it all in his stride. We found evidence of both species even in this harsh landscape but mainly inhollows, dips and valleys where soil was a bit deeper, temperature a bit cooler and the forest was dominated by non-cacti species. Unfortunately during Pedro’s time in the field we also came across several charcoal ovens along a valley we surveyed near the border with Haiti – it was a sad site to come across magnificent large trees being felled for charcoal. Many of the people doing this are desperately poor and see very few viable alternatives to this activity. The people carrying out this type of deforestation are well aware that it is illegal and live in fear of getting caught, several fled into the forest when we approached a charcoal oven that was in the middle of being built.

Over the following months we are going to be pretty busy. We will continue doing a lot more extensive field work as well as stepping up on the educational and awareness raising front with the help of both the Sociedad Ornitologica de la Hispaniola and the national zoo (Parque Zoologico Nacional de la Republica Dominicana). We are also working with Daniela Rusowsky from Funk Productions (www.funkproductions.wordpress.com) to produce a series of infomercial video films. Potentially, a couple of graduate students will also be joining the project and our plan for doing research into the sounds these species make should also be taking shape. Exciting and busy times all round.

I was interviewed by an online magazine in January and you can read the results of this at: http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0118_hance_nunezmino. The project now also has its own dedicated website: www.thelastsurvivors.org which gives a lot more information about both species and everyone involved in the project as well as setting the project into the wider context of what’s happened to the endemic mammals of the Caribbean. If you are keen to find out more then I strongly recommend you log on although as always we are always happy to answer any questions directly.

For now and until our next update, I bid you farewell.