Full Text

Living on the wind-swept Ascension Island, lying as it does in the middle of the Atlantic with Britain 4,000 miles in one direction and the Falklands 4,000 miles in the other, the simple pleasure of an evening spent with a cat on your lap should not be underestimated. And thereby hangs a tale, a remarkable conservation success story that would rid the island of a marauding migrant horde.

Discovered in 1502, the tiny volcanic island remained largely ignored until the 19th century when it was garrisoned to thwart potential efforts to rescue Napoleon from his exile on St Helena, 700 miles to the south. With the Marines, however, came predators.

Rats stowed away on ships and came ashore, and cats were introduced to contain the rodents. Both found easy prey in the abundant seabird colonies and over the next 200 years brought some species to the brink of extinction. With the exception of sooty terns, the seabirds were driven from the mainland and forced on to the sea stacks dotted around the coast. Although the sooty terns continued to nest on land, cats each year slaughtered them in their thousands.

At the start of the millennium a plan was conceived to redress the balance. With £500,000 funding from the Foreign Office and assistance from the RSPB, Wildlife Management International and the Army Ornithological Society, not to mention countless volunteers, a scheme was implemented to eradicate the island's feral cats.

As the self-taught veterinary surgeon, I was involved from the start. In order to protect the domestic cat population of more than 180, all pet cats had to be neutered, micro-chipped and registered. The process was known locally as ‘chop and chip'.

Some 75,000 poison baits were laid by a team of experts flown in from New Zealand during the initial nine-month phase. There followed a two-year mopping up period during which the last remaining feral cats were trapped and put down. On 31 January, 2004, the last feral cat was captured and killed. Monitoring went on until 2006 when the island was declared feral cat free.

Was it worth it? Well the conservationists certainly think so. Five of the twelve species of seabirds found on and around the island returned to nest within the first five years and sooty tern predation is virtually non-existent. Although the numbers of nests may appear disappointing this is apparently not unusual. It will take time for larger numbers to colonize the island. In the past two months the most exciting success has been the discovery of two nesting Ascension Frigatebirds (Fregata aquila) on the main island for the first time in over 150 years.

Pet owners may take more convincing. Four out of ten registered pet cats were lost to the poison. The 1km no-poison buffer zone was insufficient to protect pets. In hindsight a 2km zone would have been better. An increase in black rat numbers has also rather taken the shine off things. Lacking any predator and now having sole access to bird nests, they have done rather well out of the scheme.

Another winner is the Government Conservation Department. In 2001, a single conservation officer held the fort. Now there are 11 full-time staff and a small army of volunteers.

Just 700 miles to the south, St Helena is building a commercial airport. It is too early to say what impact that may have on Ascension Island but it raises the possibility of eco-tourism on both islands.

Unfortunately for the 700 people living on Ascension, their position remains precarious. Whitehall has decreed that no one shall ever have the right of abode and all of us are here for work. (Apart from my day job, I am a scuba diving instructor, first aid trainer, shipping agent and have been a JP, councillor and editor of The Islander.)

It is hard to see a day when tourism would ever generate an income sufficient to allow a resident population. Small wonder then that many islanders say the seabirds, turtles and ferns have more rights than their children.

Caroline Yon manages the European Space Agency tracking station on Ascension Island. She was made an MBE for services to the island community