BONAIRE:--- The Dutch Caribbean Nature Alliance (DCNA) recently supported the attendance of representatives from the Protected Area Management Organizations of Aruba (Fundacion Parke Nacional Aruba), Bonaire (STINAPA), Saba (Saba Conservation Foundation), and Sint Maarten (the Nature Foundation) to a five-day BirdsCaribbean Landbird Monitoring Workshop in Jarabacoa, the Dominican Republic where participants were trained in increasing the capability to monitor land birds in the wider-Caribbean Region.
Monitoring the health of land bird populations is vitally important to understand changes in population sizes and distributions of species in response to environmental changes and threats, such as climate change, pollution, invasive species, development, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, and more. Through the monitoring of the health of land bird populations in the Dutch Caribbean, conservation managers will be better able to tell how these species, and the natural areas in which they live, are doing. The data they gather will help decision-makers to plan conservation and management actions to ensure the Dutch Caribbean’s amazing birds will be around for our children and grandchildren to see and enjoy.
We are grateful to Birds Caribbean for organizing this Training of Trainers workshop. With the skills learned during this workshop we will be able to increase the way we protect our natural areas on land which are some of the most threatened spaces on our islands,” commented Tadzio Bervoets, Director of the DCNA.
The participation of qualified local conservationists to the workshop was made possible through the support of the US Fish and Wildlife Service Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act Fund, Environment and Climate Change Canada, US Forest Service International Programs, Optics for the Tropics, and the DCNA.
Photo caption: From left to right: Kai Wulf, Director at the Saba Conservation Foundation; Caren Eckrich, Biologist at STINAPA Bonaire; Melanie Meijer Zu Schlochtern, Manager of the St. Maarten Nature Foundation; Tadzio Bervoets, Director Dutch Caribbean Nature Alliance; Giancarlo Nunes, Conservation Manager Aruba National Parks Foundation; Jilly Sarpong, Terrestrial Park Ranger STINAPA Bonaire at the BirdsCaribbean Terrestrial Bird Monitoring Workshop in Jarabacoa, Dominican Republic (Credit: Giselle Dean, Bahamas National Trust- all rights reserved
