Source: EurekAlert

16 October, 2007

Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF) botanists have published a list of all the introduced plants growing in Puerto Villamil, Isabela Island, the third largest town in Galapagos. 261 species were recorded, 39 of which were found growing wild.

Despite 95% of the archipelago falling under the Galapagos National Park, invasive plants spreading from the inhabited areas are having large impacts on the native flora and fauna.

Anne Guezou, one of the botanists of CDF, says: "Thanks to the cooperation of residents we were able to visit every property in Puerto Villamil and obtain the first complete baseline of introduced species."

Five species were identified as potentially serious weeds that should be completely eradicated from the island, including the "lead tree" Leucaena leucocephala, regarded as one of the worst tropical weeds.

"By identifying invaders before they become widespread, and investing in their eradication or control we can protect this World Heritage site from their impacts." says Guezou. She adds, "Early detection must go hand in hand with preventing the arrival of more non-native plants into Galapagos".

Staff at the Charles Darwin Research Station are working with the Galapagos National Park and SESA (Ecuadorian Agricultural Health Service) to prevent importation of plants from mainland Ecuador.

This work was accomplished with the support of Project "Control of Invasive Species in the Galapagos Archipelago", a donation from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to the Ecuadorian Government, represented by the Ministry of Environment.

To view the complete research article, visit Preventing Establishment: An Inventory of Introduced Plants in Puerto Villamil, Isabela Island, Galapagos.

www.darwinfoundation.org
Contact: Ivonne Guzmán
cdfinfo@fcdarwin.org.ec

We would like to share news about our work with you. This is what we have been doing during October in the Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF):

• We started the month at sea on board the Mary Anne, with representatives from the Galapagos National Park and the tourism sector. We were participating in a workshop to define the early stages of a process that will lead to a new model for tourism.
• We also have some good news of our own. After an arduous selection process, Aldo Jaramillo has joined our team as the new CDF Head of Human Resources. Among his first tasks were the interviews to choose the Director of Science, whose name we hope to share with you in our next bulletin.
• As for management, our new field team in Floreana monitored the critically endangered plants of the island. The good news is that since the eradication of the goats, five native plants have recovered. The bad: two sites of important biodiversity in Floreana are threatened by invasive plants, but we are working on this.
• Project work has not slowed down. We have a new project with students from the Central University of Ecuador, which consists of creating gardens of native plants at the entrance to Puerto Ayora. For this we are collaborating with the Santa Cruz local authorities, with the electricity company, the firefighters and Petrocomercial.
• Furthermore, we are moving ahead with monitoring the blackberry in Floreana. 21 Park wardens and CDF staff have studied 43 hectares, in which 254 blackberry plants were found.
• But our monitoring has also produced some encouraging data. This month we are analysing the information gathered during the September census of penguins and cormorants. We can now count on an estimated population of 1770 penguins, which means that the species is stable. And 1927 cormorants, which is the highest population since monitoring of this species began in 1977.
• In addition, we supported SESA SICGAL in drawing up the blueprint for a census of domestic introduced species in the rural areas of the four inhabited islands.
• With SESA SICGAL and the Fabricio Valverde Epidemiology, Pathology and Genetic Laboratory of the Park we have been preparing for the possible arrival of two serious illnesses in Galapagos - West Nile Virus and avian flu. Our partners in this project included members of the Farming Committee-SICGAL, SNEM, CIMEI, poultry farmers and the environmental police. Thus the Rapid Response Team for Health Crises was founded.
• Finally we can announce that we are finishing the evaluation of the state of conservation of 108 endemic species of moths in Galapagos. We discovered that one moth species of Espanola is critically endangered, 15 species are in danger of extinction and 22 species are vulnerable. These assessments will be sent to IUCN (World Conservation Union) for inclusion in the Red List.
• All that remains to be said is that collaborative work has been important during October, because, together with the Park, we started a rat eradication campaign on Seymour North. This was successful and we have now moved on to the monitoring stage. Moreover, again together with the Park, we have been monitoring iguanas and cactus on Baltra, using the new method of distance estimation. In this way, we registered more than 700 iguanas, many of them in areas where they were not expected to be, and maps were made of cactus density, which will allow us to track population trends in the future.

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Source: International Galapagos Tour Operators Association

Galapagos authorities are implementing a new system for controlling immigration in the Islands. There are about five thousand illegal immigrants living permanently in the islands and the number continues to rise each year.

The aims of the plan focus on: 1) stopping illegal immigrants entrance onto the islands; 2) improve the procedures for authorising permanent residencies; 3) improve the quality of logistics for immigration control; and regulate illegal residents under legal bases.

All visitors that travel to Galapagos will be required to buy a $10 USD transit control card (Tarjeta de Control de Tránsito) TCT. The new ID will hold the general information of the traveller, a picture of the card holder, a chip, and a bar code. The value of the card is additional to the 100 USD fee for entrance to the Galapagos National Park.

Control officers will use a laser device to track the arrival and departure of passengers to Galapagos. This information will be kept on records which, therefore, includes the overall length of stay in the Islands.

The new card will be expedited to all visitors and this process won't include the permanent residents that hold a resident card.

There's not an official starting date yet for the new immigration control plan. Authorities are trying to get the cards and the appropriate technology ready in the next weeks.

The new Webpage for the TCT is under construction now and it will provide more information in the following weeks: http://www.ingala.gov.ec/tct/

Source: Galapagos Conservancy

www.galapagos.org

The recent addition of the Galapagos Islands to UNESCO's List of World Heritage Sites in Danger underscores the need for the Ecuadorian Government to take meaningful, decisive action on a wide spectrum of conservation issues surrounding Galapagos. A recent Presidential Decree, which legalises the sale and export of shark meat and fins under certain circumstances, is controversial and its implementation may have grave consequences for conservation efforts in Galapagos and Ecuador.

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa has repealed Decree 2130, which prohibited the fishing and trading of shark fins. With this repeal, fishermen will once again be allowed to legally sell and export shark meat and fins, with the proviso that they demonstrate to officials that the shark is accidental by-catch.

Shark fishing as an industry remains banned in Ecuador. However, should a shark be accidentally caught during legal fishing activities, that shark in its entirety may be presented to government officials, certified as by-catch, and sold in Ecuador or exported. Fishermen are banned from using gear or practices that would increase shark by-catch.

President Correa defends this repeal, saying that it will directly benefit 200,000 Ecuadorian fishermen on the continent and will stop the black market by making these economic transactions more transparent.

We are concerned that this repeal will open the flood gates for illegal shark fishing. The authorities that will be responsible for monitoring shark by-catch are under-staffed, under-trained, and will be overwhelmed as this repeal takes hold. The implementation of these regulations will be extremely problematic and open to interference.

It is important to note that this repeal does not apply to Galapagos - the sale, capture, and fishing of sharks is still illegal in Galapagos waters. However, many of the sharks caught in Ecuador are caught in Galapagos waters, leaving much of the burden of this repeal's enforcement on Park wardens and police in Galapagos.

Galapagos Conservancy and colleagues in Ecuador are mindful of the difficult political climate in which this decision has taken place and are monitoring the government's actions very carefully.