by Amelaïd Houmadi and Kitty Brayne

They're among the biggest flying mammals in the world, found on two small islands in the Comoros archipelago in the Indian Ocean, and nowhere else in the world. In the Comorian language they are sometimes called m’lamanga which means mango-eater (but also have two other names: n’tréméla or ndéma), but it was from the explorer Dr Livingstone that they got their name with which they are known to the rest of the world. I'm talking about Livingstone's fruit bats, and at the moment it's my job to study them with the ECDD project in Anjouan.

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by Bronwen Daniel

In February this year, I waved goodbye to the snow-covered British Isles to take up the position of Field Biologist for the ECDD project (run by Bristol Conservation and Science Foundation in partnership with Durrell) in the tropical Comoro Islands.

Having previously worked on research projects in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania and Madagascar, I’d experienced a range of African landscapes but imagined volcanic islands in the middle of the Indian Ocean between Mozambique and Madagascar to be something a bit different. My first view of Anjouan, the second largest of the islands and my home for the next year and a half, was from the window of a tiny 12-seater plane. It did not disappoint. I took in steep-sided green mountains cut through with deep ravines, plunging down to a sparkling blue sea, and couldn’t wait to get out exploring.

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By Misbahou Mohamed & Kitty Brayne (BCSF)

The best way to learn about different approaches to conservation and sustainable development is to visit field projects and talk to the people on the ground about their experiences. In our work in the Comoros we’ve found exchange visits between villages to be an excellent way to inspire people to take up new techniques or behaviours. Working in the Comoros we sometimes feel a bit isolated as there are not many other projects or organisations working in this domain. So last month half of our team went over to our larger neighbour Madagascar to visit a few projects and exchange ideas with others working in similar fields.

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By Katie Green (BCSF)

While the community team have been busy working on agricultural development and natural resource management activities, the ecological monitoring team have been scaling the steep Comorian mountains searching for and recording the islands’ unique biodiversity and monitoring forest habitats. Click here to read more about our ecological monitoring and research work.

The arrival of Merlijn Jocque, a field biologist employed by Durrell to support the ecological monitoring programme, brings the team up to five people. Surveying all three islands in detail twice a year (dry and wet season) is pretty exhausting so an additional pair of highly-skilled hands is going to make things a lot easier. It also means that I am now able to devote some time to completing the first high-resolution land cover maps of the Comoros.

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