ADU 20th Anniversary Celebrations

National Botanical Gardens (Pietermaritzburg), 11 February 2012

The Animal Demography Unit was established in 1991, then as the Avian Demography Unit, with SABAP1 and SAFRING as the two main projects. Additional citizen scientist projects followed soon thereafter in the form of CWAC (Coordinated Waterbird Counts), BIRP (Birds In Reserves Project), CAR (Coordinated Avifaunal Roadcounts)and a revised Nest Record Card Scheme (NERCS). These have remained part of the ADU's ongoing, long-term, citizen-science monitoring programmes and have collected millions of records over the last 20 years.

Due to the ADU's 'atlasing' expertise, other animal groups were included under the atlasing umbrella and the Southern African Frog Atlas Project (SAFAP) and Southern African Reptile Conservation Assessment (SARCA) were produced and represented important milestones for the ADU. Recently the Southern African Butterfly Conservation Assessment (SABCA) ended providing, for the first time, a detailed look at the distribution and conservation of butterflies in southern Africa.

The ADU is also involved in numerous other bird research projects including population monitoring and movements of African Penguins, and survival and breeding success of Hadeda Ibis on the Cape peninsula. Our Virtual Museums have proved popular and successful and have contributed many records to the reptile, butterfly and weaver colony projects.

Without the participation and involvement of citizen scientists the wealth of data and information stored at the ADU would certainly reduce the impact that we have on biodiversity conservation in southern Africa. As such our 20-year celebrations honour you, the citizen scientist. Thank you for your on-going support from all of us at the ADU. Together we are making a difference!