Island Restoration
The field of island restoration is usually credited with having been started in New Zealand in the 1960s, but other smaller projects, such as the restoration of Nonsuch Island in Bermuda (which began in 1962) have been going on for almost as long. Nevertheless, the program undertaken by the Department of Conservation (DOC) is one of the largest in the world. It began on Cuvier Island, where ecologists removed stock, goats, feral cats and finally, in 1993, Pacific Rats. The success of the project resulted in similar projects around New Zealand. The advantages to the DOC were considerable; in addition to protecting species endemic to smaller islands, like the Magenta Petrel, islands near the mainland, once restored, could act as habitat for species of birds that were unable to survive on the mainland. Species like the Takahe, where the remaining wild population was at considerable risk from feral cats and dogs, could be moved to these islands to safeguard the species.
Read more about this topic: Island Restoration
Famous quotes containing the words island and/or restoration:
““Our island home
Is far beyond the wave;we will no longer roam.””
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)
“I claim that in losing the spinning wheel we lost our left lung. We are, therefore, suffering from galloping consumption. The restoration of the wheel arrests the progress of the fell disease.”
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948)