The uniqueness of the Juan Fernández Islands extends to its threatened native bird community, which is rich in endemic species and subspecies. Four of the six seabird species and two of the nine landbird species have been assessed as globally threatened on the IUCN Red List . Both of the listed landbird species, Juan Fernández firecrown and Másafuera rayadito Aphrastura masafuerae, are Critically Endangered and endemic to the archipelago. The firecrown is the only species of hummingbird in the world endemic to an island. The island where it occurs, Isla Robinson Crusoe, has been identified as a priority site for preventing global species extinctions by the Alliance for Zero Extinction (AZE). Recent censuses of both species suggest that the populations are between 800 and 3000 individuals. The combination of such low, declining populations and distributions confined to a single island, renders both species highly vulnerable to extinction.

Principal threats appear to be the same for both species, namely the loss of breeding and foraging habitat through deforestation, predation by introduced mammals, and habitat alteration through impacts of invasive plant species. Introduced mammals, through both predation and competition for breeding burrows, are also considered to be a primary threat to the breeding seabird community. Mortality in commercial fisheries in both Chilean and international waters may pose an additional potential threat to seabirds of the archipelago.

Conservation International (CI) and the American Bird Conservancy (ABC) have been supporting the work of the Juan Fernández Islands Conservancy, an organization of North American and Chilean conservation biologists working towards the conservation of the archipelago’s avifauna and restoration of natural systems. To date, projects have included the most rigorous population surveys of the firecrown, rayadito and five of the seabird species, quantitative assessments of the impacts of introduced mammals, invasive plant control programs in critical forest habitat, and community-based conservation and education programs.

To address some of these threats, the Maruia Trust of New Zealand, the government of New Caledonia’s Province Nord, and Conservation International initiated a conservation co-management project in the northeastern portion of the main island of Grande Terre. Among the objectives of the project are controlling invasive species, reducing the impact of fires, promoting environmentally sound development opportunities, and gaining community involvement. Globally threatened species targeted by the project include an endemic flightless bird called Kagu Rhynochetos jubatus, EN and the palm tree Lavoixia macrocarpa, CR, with a known global population of only 30 trees. Rats are a major threat to both species, eating the eggs of the former and the seeds of the latter.

Controlling invasive species is perhaps the most urgent conservation need in New Caledonia. There are over 800 invasive plants, 400 invertebrates, and almost 40 vertebrate species. Rats, cats, deer, pigs, and the fire ant are among the most destructive, pushing many endemic species to the brink of extinction. With the assistance of the government of New Zealand and the IUCN Invasive Species Specialist Group, the Mont Panié project was initiated to create a virtually invasive-free “island” within a 1-square-kilometer plot within the rainforest. While costly and time intensive, the project has been successful in using traps to greatly reduce the rat population within the plot; it also targets cats and pigs through traps and hunting, respectively. There are now plans to extend this approach to other areas of the reserve.

The Mont Panié project aims to sustain and increase local people’s enthusiasm and commitment to conservation by promoting environmentally sound development opportunities such as controlled ecotourism. Since 2003, project staff and local people have built and maintained an expanding network of trails through the Mont Panié reserve, and have produced signboards and educational materials. Many of the trails were built through a buffer area outside of the reserve, and this has greatly reduced the incidence of fires in this buffer zone. Several local people have opened small traditional guesthouses for tourists, and others serve as guides within the reserve.

The project has been very successful in gaining local involvement. In April of 2004, after 18 months of work, clans and government representatives in the vicinity of the Mont Panié rainforest joined together to form Dayu Biik, an association named after the majestic kaori tree endemic to the massif. Since then, project activities and responsibilities have been increasingly taken on by local people.

Through targeting conservation activities strategically, promoting awareness, providing development opportunities, and most importantly through involving local people and the government in all conservation activities, the Mont Panié project hopes to ensure sustainability over time. The government of Province Nord plans to build on the success of this initiative through similar projects in other areas of New Caledonia.

In response to this crisis, American Bird Conservancy (ABC), a US non-profit organization based in Virginia, is supporting bird conservation actions at 18 AZE sites across the Tropical Andes hotspot. In 2005, in partnership with Asociación Ecosistemas Andinos (Peru), Fundación ProAves (Colombia), and Fundación Jocotoco (Ecuador), ABC supported the acquisition and protection of 40 properties at nine Andean AZE sites to protect 21,179 acres (equivalent to half the size of Washington, DC). ABC established the first protected areas at five AZE sites to ensure the survival of ten AZE bird species. This network of reserves also provides critically needed protection for many other endemic flora and fauna species, many of which are threatened or have simply not been assessed yet.

The cost of such bold conservation action averaged just $37 per acre. Of course, the adequate long-term protection of the reserves and their threatened species depends on both expanding those protected areas further and establishing long-term financing mechanisms, such as ecotourism and trust funds. However, what is clear is that for a relatively modest sum, protection of our treasured natural heritage is well within reach.

ABC strongly encourages support for the establishment and expansion of networks of private protected areas at strategic locations such as AZE and Key Biodiversity Areas, to help prevent extinctions.

Doğa Derneği (DD) is a leading Turkish NGO whose mission is to protect Turkey’s threatened species and Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs), through a national grassroot network. To effectively target conservation action on the ground within Turkey’s biodiversity hotspots, DD has just completed the identification of 305 KBAs in the country. This inventory of globally important sites for biodiversity conservation will be published in Turkish as “Turkey’s Key Biodiversity Areas” later this year, representing the first national KBA directory in the world. This book will be a unique reference publication for national and international stakeholders in conserving site-level priorities in Turkey. It will help promote the concept of KBAs and the Natura 2000 Network (European areas of special concern) both nationally and globally and will serve as a model for other countries.

The 305 KBAs cover 21,226,681 hectares (about 27% of Turkey's total surface area) and 85% of these lack a formal protection status. DD is now taking action in 15 KBAs across the Irano-Anatolian, Caucasus and Mediterranean hotspots in collaboration with local authorities, universities and local NGOs. In addition, DD is working to establish a Zero Extinction Fund, in collaboration with the Turkish Ministry of Environment and Forestry and UNDP Turkey, and with the support of the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality and media sponsors CNN-TURK TV and ATLAS magazine. This initiative, to be directed at AZE sites in Turkey (the highest priority KBAs), aims to raise the financial support needed to implement ten urgent projects to halt biodiversity loss in Turkey by 2010.

Finally, DD, in partnership with the Georgian Center for the Conservation of Wildlife (GCCW) and the CI Center for Applied Biodiversity Science, has just started a new project in the Caucasus hotspot entitled “Enhancing conservation in the West Lesser Caucasus through transboundary cooperation and establishing a training programme on KBA conservation”. This project, supported by the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund, will enable DD to delineate KBAs in Turkey and GCCW to initiate KBA work in Georgia. It will also provide training for local KBA caretakers for successful on-the-ground conservation and establish an international working group for management of a transboundary KBA.

A specimen of this blonde capuchin, found in Alagoas state in northeastern Brazil, was catalogued in the National Museum in Rio de Janeiro in 1987. Allfredo Langguth, formerly a curator at the museum, has been studying its taxonomic history since then. Exhaustive zoological and taxonomic research and numerous expeditions to northeast Brazil, conducted by Marcelo Marcelino and Allfredo Langguth, resulted in a publication in the Boletim do Museu Nacional in July 2006, which showed that Margrave’s capuchin monkey is distinct from Cebus libidinosus, and that its correct name is Cebus flavius – the original caitaia of Marcgrave. Cebus flavius has been observed in mangroves along the coast and in quite a number of the few remaining fragments of Atlantic Forest between the states of Rio Grande do Norte and Alagoas.

The story of Cebus flavius is a good example of the importance of preserving and cataloguing specimens in scientific collections. It was known only from drawings and paintings and its taxonomic status remained a mystery until Oliveira and Langguth’s painstaking research shed light on where it occurs and on its true identity. An understanding of taxonomy, the catalogue of Linnaeus (and Marcgrave was a principal source for Linnaeus), is absolutely vital, particularly in understanding the biological diversity of the hotspot in order to preserve it.