John Ridgway Save the Albatross Voyage 2003-4

Birdlife Volunteer:

Leg 6, Port Stanley (Falklands) to South Georgia

Leg 7, South Georgia to Gough Island

Leg 8, Gough Island to Capetown

I have discovered it’s never too late to change who you are. A few years ago, working in an office in the middle of Johannesburg, I realised that all I’d ever done was to write programs to move numbers around. None of these numbers were real, and none of them involved my real passion for the natural environment. So I decided my talents would be better employed elsewhere.

I changed from a computer programmer to a conservation biologist and I am now employed by BirdLife International’s Seabird Conservation Priogramme. I live on a farm in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, with my partner, Pierre Pistorius.

However, I have not entirely left my computer training behind. For the BirdLife project we are collating world-wide satellite information for the 22 threatened species of albatross and petrel, to produce detailed distribution maps, which can be used to pin-point important areas for the conservation of these birds. Once more this involves writing programs to move lots of numbers around but now the numbers mean a lot to me!

We are also developing a web-site to make these maps available to the Public. And this means that together with maps of fishing effort and by-catch statistics, they can be used to pressure governments and fishery bodies to regulate the long-line fishing industry more closely.

So what is a reformed computer guru doing on a yacht in the Southern Ocean? Well, in 2000/1, I spent just over a year on Marion Island in the Prince Edward Islands Group, two small sub-Antarctic Islands owned by South Africa. I worked for the FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, on a monitoring programme aimed at determining the effects of long-line fishing on several seabird species which breed on the island. This was a very special year of my life, and gave me an immense love of albatrosses and the life of the Southern Ocean. It also made me very aware of the disastrous effect the long-lining was having on the albatrosses I worked with.

So, when the opportunity arose to sail the Southern Ocean and see more of its islands, while making a constructive contribution towards saving its seabirds, I just couldn’t resist. This will also change me from a landlubber to a sailor, and hopefully I will enjoy the change!

Although I am fortunate to be involved in a project which has direct conservation implications for the birds that I love, it will take many years to implement our findings.

For the albatross, action must be taken NOW!

The Ridgways’ “Save the Albatross” voyage is an example to us all: to make an immediate and personal contribution towards saving some part of our world that is special to us. I feel immensely privileged to be part of that contribution.

Frances Taylor

Eastern Cape, South Africa

May 2003

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