Parish of St. John
We’ll only briefly touch down in St. John which is home to the red-billed chough reintroduction and habitat restoration project along the north coast of the island (check out last month’s blog to learn more about this impressive conservation program).
Parish of St. Ouen
A little further west along the coast in the parish of St. Ouen is a seabird protection zone for the last remaining individuals of a once large puffin breeding colony that return annually to breed in borrows and crevices in the sea cliffs. The number of returning puffins is dwindling each year potentially due in part to declines in their preferred prey, sandeels, due to sea temperature increases.
A festival was held to mark the return of the puffins (complete with singing Irish drinking songs) as well as raise awareness about the plight of these birds.
While I didn’t see any puffins that day, there were northern fulmars, European shags, razorbills, and oystercatchers feeding in the waters or nesting on cliffs, and, most excitingly for me, green lizards sunning themselves on a grassy sand dune!
St. Ouen, the biggest parish, extends along most of the west coast of the island and contains many different habitat types. I assisted with several farmland bird surveys in heathland and coastal grassland habitats.
Fourteen sites throughout Jersey are surveyed every two weeks to track changes in the population size of farmland birds such as skylarks, meadow pipits, stonechats, and linnets and provide recommendations for conservation actions and strategies to support birds and habitat.
Parish of St. Brelade
In the southwest of the island another native species, the agile frog, is managing to hang on thanks to collaborative efforts to prevent its extirpation after being reduced to one single wetland population in the late 1980s.
Similar to WPC’s Oregon spotted frog conservation program, Durrell headstarts agile frog tadpoles at the Jersey Zoo and releases them to suitable wetland habitat just before metamorphosis to reinforce the wild population and hopefully re-establish metapopulations throughout the island.
