Back in 1972, just as our splendid new hutia accommodation was nearing completion, I got a telephone call from Fleur Cowles, one of our trustees. She told me that the Hollywood star, Jimmy Stewart, and his wife Gloria were going to visit her and that she was going to bring them over to Jersey. Always with an eye to the main chance, I asked if Mr Stewart would like to open our new hutia breeding unit to provide some publicity for the Trust. Back came the answer that he would be delighted.
On the appointed day I went down to the airport to meet them. Stewart was unassumingly himself, walking with a slight cowboy slouch, drawling sentences in his lovely husky voice. Gloria was a handsome woman, immaculately groomed as only a wealthy American can be, with immense charm but a slight glitter in her eyes, which told me she could easily resemble one of Mr Wodehouse’s famous aunts if things did not turn out to her satisfaction. She was the sort of spirited person to whom maîtres d’hotel give instant allegiance and servility, in case worse than their wildest nightmares should ensue. As we waited outside the airport for John to bring the car round, talking about this and that, James Stewart suddenly disappeared. One minute he was there tall, gangling, a gentle smile on his face – the next he had softly and silently vanished like a puff of smoke. One would have thought it impossible for such a big man (in every sense of the word) to eclipse himself so deftly without anyone noticing.
‘Where is Jimmy?’ Gloria asked suddenly and accusingly, as if we were concealing him from her. We all looked around vacantly.
‘Perhaps he has gone to the comfort station,’ I said, using an American euphemism I adore.
‘He did that on the plane,’ said Gloria. ‘Where on earth is he?’
Having eliminated the comfort station as a possible hiding place, I could not think for the life of me where he could have gone. Gloria’s increasing agitation infected me with a sense of unease. Had he been kidnapped? I could see the world headlines in the illiterate press: ‘James Stewart snatched at hutia party – famous actor becomes as extinct as the animals he went to visit.’ This was not the sort of publicity I was seeking for the Trust.
At that moment, John rolled up in the car. ‘Shall I go and tell Mr. Stewart the car’s here?’ he asked.
‘Where is he?’ everyone asked in unison.
‘He’s out there on the tarmac looking at a plane,’ said John.
‘Go and get him, please,’ said Gloria. ‘He can’t keep his hands off planes.’
‘How did he get out there?’ I asked, for airport security is very tight in Jersey.
‘Can you imagine anyone stopping him, seeing who he is?’ asked John.
Presently, the truant loped back into our midst.
‘Er . . . kinda nice little plane out there,’ he explained. ‘Yeah, sorta little job, very near. Kinda cosy, you know. Neat. Hadn’t seen one before.’
‘Get into the car, Jimmy,’ said Gloria, ‘you’re holding everyone up.’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Jimmy, either unrepentant or not listening. ‘I’m glad I saw that. Kinda neat.’
After we had lunched he opened our hutia nursery with great charm, saying that he had always liked Hoot Ears ever since he first met them, which was about five minutes ago. This ordeal over, we took them out to dinner at a friend’s house.
Over drinks in the conservatory and the excellent meal that followed it, Jimmy seemed preoccupied. I think he was suffering from jetlag, which has a stultifying effect on anyone. The meal over, we repaired to the drawing room where Jimmy carefully lowered his gangling shape into the bosom of an enormous sofa. His eyes wandered vaguely round the room and suddenly focused on something that interested him.
‘Gee, it’s a piana,’ he said, his eyes fixed longingly on the baby grand that crouched in the corner.
‘Jimmy, no,’ said Gloria Stewart, warningly.
‘Yes sir, a piana,’ said Jimmy, with the delight of one making the discovery of the century, ‘a kinda little baby piana.’
‘Jimmy, you’re not to,’ said Gloria.
‘A little toon . . .’ said Stewart musingly, starting to unravel his length from the sofa, a fanatical gleam in his eye, ‘a toon – what’s that toon I like?’
‘Please Jimmy, don’ t play the piano,’ said Gloria desperately.
‘Oh, I know . . . “Ragtime Cowboy Joe” . . . ,’ said Jimmy approaching the instrument, ‘Yes siree, “Ragtime Cowboy Joe”.’
‘Jimmy, I beseech you,’ said Gloria, her voice breaking.
‘Yes, a kinda nice, swinging toon, that.’ Jimmy seated himself on the piano stool. He lifted the lid and the baby grand grinned at him like a crocodile
‘Now – er – let’s see – er, how did it go,’ said Jimmy, plonking his long fingers on the keys. We were immediately apprised of two facts. The first was that Jimmy Stewart was tone deaf and the other that he could not play the piano. In addition, he had forgotten all the lyrics except the basic one of the title. In all the years I had watched his impeccable performances on the screen, I had never seen him do anything like this. He played all the wrong notes and sang out of tune, trying to make the two match. In his husky, croaking voice he sang the title of the song over and over again, going back to the beginning when he thought he had missed something out. It was like watching an armless man try to swim the English Channel and yet it was excruciatingly funny, but you did not dare laugh as he was taking such pride in his performance. In the end, he exterminated ‘Ragtime Cowboy Joe’ to his satisfaction and then turned to us, happy in his achievement.
‘Would anyone like to hear some other toons?’ he enquired generously. I was tempted to ask for the ‘Star Spangled Banner’, but it was not to be.
‘Jimmy, we must go,’ said Gloria.
And go they did.
To have been given a performance like this by the great James Stewart was an honour, but I was sure his wife did not agree.
It is always exciting when a new animal arrives at the Trust’s collection, is released into its new quarters and you can watch it settle down. The Hoot Ears, as christened by Jimmy Stewart, however, proved to be the exception rather than the rule. Handsome, portly animals though they were, with heavy hindquarters which made them look as if they were wearing trousers several sizes too large for them, they lacked the scintillating personality one might have hoped for. They displayed all the joie de vivre of a bevy of churchwardens attending the funeral of one of their number. There was only one thing they did which could possibly be described as eccentric. Like most creatures, they had not read the textbook description of their behaviour and so they did not know that they were supposed to be strictly terrestrial. Ponderously, and with total lack of expression, they would climb up the branches in their cages and perch near the ceiling – one supposed imagining themselves to be flocks of flightless birds. True, I did see the young ones frequently indulge in what could be described as ‘catch-as-catch-can’ games, but they were of a very staid variety and one was reminded of over-weight Victorian children indulging because their elders expected it of them.
When the numbers of young we had bred were sufficiently high, we started thinking in terms of reintroduction. Our then Research Assistant, William Oliver, went out to Jamaica to fix up all the preliminaries, which included the selection of a suitable site (a place that seemed satisfactory from the hutias’ point of view, particularly freedom from hunting pressure) and the involvement of Hope Zoo in Kingston in the venture. A total of forty-four of our Jersey-bred hutias were sent out in 1985-6, and settled in their family groups in specially built cages at the Hope Zoo. Meanwhile, an extensive vegetation survey was done on the chosen site to make sure that the hutias would lack for nothing in terms of foodstuffs. Then they were transferred to the release site, each family group into a temporary enclosure surrounding a specially constructed, semi-artificial rock warren or ‘coney’ hole. After a week or two, when the ani
mals seemed to be used to their new situation, the fence was removed and the progress of each group was monitored for up to three months.
Early reports were most encouraging. Only three disappeared during this initial monitoring period, but the rest of them rapidly became self-sufficient and remained in good condition. Our hopes were high that the reintroduction was going to be a great success. However, when the site was reinvestigated later in the year only eight hutias could be located. These animals, which included two conceived and born on the site, were all in excellent condition. However, no others were found during a six-week search. In the following year only two animals were found, one a Jersey-bred specimen and the other thought to be wild born. Both were in good condition, but the whereabouts of the rest of the specimens was, and remains, a mystery. The animals that had been released had, early on, adapted to the wild excellently and behaved as normal wild hutias do. This site seemed eminently suitable with a plentiful food supply and freedom from hunting pressure. We had to conclude, therefore, that the disappearance was due to illness or to predation by feral dogs and cats. However, we haven’t given up hope – literally – because we are now working with the Hope Zoo to establish a sufficiently large breeding colony there from which a second reintroduction, with the help of students from the University of the West Indies, will be attempted.
All the frustrations involved in releasing animals to the wild are more than made up for when you join forces with people and meet with success, as in the case of the golden lion tamarins. These enchanting creatures, smallest of the primates, along with their close relatives, the marmosets, live in the coastal rainforest of Brazil. Unfortunately, this special rainforest has been ruthlessly and thoughtlessly destroyed and all that is left are pockets of trees, some not even connected with one another, so that the animals of each of these pockets are isolated and cannot renew their species’ genetic resources by mixing and mating with others of their kind, even if they are only a few miles away. At one time, the Atlantic coastal rainforest covered an area of 135,000 square miles. Now less than five per cent remains and this is being steadily whittled down by axe, fire and bulldozer. As this forest is stripped, it not only drives to extinction – or its brink – the tamarins, but the myriad other creatures and plants that go to make up this extraordinary ecosystem. When you fell a tropical tree you are doing the equivalent of destroying a huge city, because of the thousands of creatures that live in, on and around it.
The golden lion tamarin is probably one of the most beautiful of all mammals. A little bigger than a newly born kitten, it has incredibly long ‘artistic’ fingers and its long fur looks, quite literally, as if it is spun gold. This amazing glittering pelt stands away from its face in a sort of semi-recumbent mane which gives it a lion-like look. Like all the marmosets and tamarins, their movements are incredibly quick and sometimes they move with such speed it is impossible to follow the movement with your eye. They are omnivorous, the bulk of their food being fruit and insects, but they will eat tree frogs with relish and will even (it has recently been discovered) go into hollow trees in the daytime to hunt for roosting bats to add to their diet. Their vocalizations are very bird-like as they communicate in a series of trills, sharp squeaks and chatterings.
In addition to the destruction of the forest, these beautiful little animals had been popular with the pet trade and for biomedical research, so by the late sixties and early seventies it was apparent that the species was in serious danger. It was estimated then that no more than 150 individuals were still living in the fragmented forest blocks which remained. This alarming state of affairs was highlighted by the brilliant work carried out by Dr Adelmar F. Coimbra-Filho, now director of the Rio de Janeiro Primate Centre. In 1972 a conference was held, during which the plight of these animals was discussed and an attempt made to assess both wild and captive populations. It was obviously of the greatest importance that self-sustaining captive populations were established while, at the same time, trying to address the problem in the wild. It is mainly due to the dedicated work of Dr Devra Kleiman that this has been so successful. Between 1972 and 1980 very few zoos had golden lions and these were mostly American. These zoos carefully expanded their small populations, and the result was spectacular. The captive population sprang from 153 to 330 – about double the wild population – within five years. Fifty to sixty golden lions were being born every year and so there was now a sufficiently large and stable population to start thinking about putting some captive-bred specimens back into the wild. The success of this project was due to the formation of a consortium of zoos for the management of this species.
In 1978 we received our first pair of golden lions and also joined the consortium. The arrival of our golden lions caused quite a sensation. It is one thing to see a painting or colour photograph of a creature, quite another to see the animal in the, flesh. These tiny primates, glittering like doubloons, raced about their cage at such speed they looked like ingots being thrown about. As they whisked about exploring their new domain, they kept up a chorus of chirrups, squeaks and chitters as if each were a miniature tour guide telling the other where it was and what to look at.
Finally, when they had settled down, they became the centre of attraction in our marmoset range for they were by far the most striking and attractive of this enchanting group of primates. Finally came the day when the female successfully gave birth to twins (the normal complement), two minuscule little gold nuggets which could each easily have fitted into a small coffee cup. At first, clinging to the dense fur of their parents and matching it so beautifully, they were extraordinarily difficult to see, for their little faces were smaller than a fifty-pence piece. As they grew older they grew bolder and would leave the security of their parent’s body to explore the cage on their own, though always ready to fly back to the security of the parent’s fur at any imagined danger. To see them in the sunshine chasing butterflies unwary enough to drift through the wire mesh was an entrancing sight. Not only was it in incredible, dainty ballet as they twisted and turned, leapt and scuttled after the pirouetting insects, but as the light caught them their coats sparkled in myriad colours from sandstone red to the colour of the palest wedding ring. For some reason my suggestion that the babies be christened Fort and Knox respectively met with such antagonism from all quarters that, outnumbered, I was forced to relinquish the idea. Meanwhile the plans for release into the wild of captive-bred lions were moving ahead. Naturally, a plan of this magnitude had to be approached with great caution and attention to detail. An ecological survey had to be done to assess the wild population of golden lions and, this done, to locate an area of forest uninhabited by a wild population but suitable for the release of the captive-bred specimens. Meanwhile, fifteen animals from five US zoos were chosen and sent to the Rio Primate Centre for training. An animal which is perhaps the third generation born in captivity is used to set mealtimes and never has to go out and search for its food. Most important of all in the cushioned world of captivity, there are no predators in the shape of snakes and hawks, and even Homo sapiens is considered an obliging gift-giving friend. So the animals have to be introduced slowly to the stern realities of life in the forest if they are to survive. At one point it was discovered that they were alarmed and daunted by tree branches which bent. In the well-conducted zoos they came from the branches were rigidly nailed into place, so a branch which gave under your weight was an alarming experience until you learnt how to cope with it. They had to learn how to incorporate into their diets wild fruit they had never seen before and here it was discovered, fascinatingly enough, that the younger animals were quicker at learning this and were showing the older ones what to do.
The initial releases got off to a slow start, but as the animals and the people in charge of the project learnt more and more they were finally successful. One photograph shows a captive-bred specimen eating a frog, an item never included in her diet in Washington, and proof that the animals had settled do
wn in their environment. The next phase involved releasing captive-bred animals with wild ones, and it was a great day when twins were produced by a female born in captivity but who had mated with a male born in the wild. By this time we had bred over twenty-five golden lions in Jersey and so were able to take part in the venture by donating five of our animals. These were released as a family group in a patch of forest with no wild tamarins present, and we’re very proud to say that our group was the first in the project to produce offspring from parents which had both been born and raised in captivity. This is proof, if proof were needed, that if all the various disciplines involved work in harmony towards a common goal, captive breeding can and does work, and with it we should be able to pull back innumerable species from the brink of extinction.
I always remember having a delightful picnic lunch with Roger Payne and his family on my second visit to America. It is Roger, of course, who has done so much wonderful whale research and is responsible for those mournfully beautiful whale songs to which one listens enraptured, longing to know what these huge and extraordinary animals are saying to each other. However, during the course of the picnic, Roger asked me what the Trust was all about and I endeavoured to explain our aims and objectives.
Finally, Roger said, ‘I think I see what you mean – you’ re breeding them to put back there, providing there is a there to put them back into’. Thus, in one pithy sentence, he highlighted one of captive breeding’s great problems: call it the ‘There Syndrome’ for want of a better description. The situation with the Rodrigues fruit bat is a case in point.
Rodrigues is a small island, which lies 406 miles east of Mauritius. It was described by an early settler, Leguat, as a paradise, thickly wooded and overflowing with wonderful creatures. There was the Solitaire, a strange long-legged ground bird not unlike today’s African secretary bird. There was a species of giant tortoise found in such profusion that it was said you could walk a league on their backs without touching the ground, rather as a squirrel in olden times in England could go from London to Aberdeen without descending to earth, using hedges and woodland as a highway. Also on this tropical paradise was a gecko three feet long, a ground parrot and many other wonders. Now Rodrigues lies in the blue sea, under a fierce sun – dry, eroded, desiccated – with scarcely any greenery left and a burgeoning human population. Gone are the long-legged Solitaires, gone the ground parrot and the giant gecko, gone the cobbled streets of tortoise backs. All that remains are a few tiny patches of forest, and in the largest, called the Cascade des Pigeons, lives a colony of golden-furred fruit bats, found nowhere else in the world. John Hartley and I had gone to Rodrigues in 1976 and collected a breeding nucleus of eighteen bats from the small colony of 120. Some were established at the Mauritius government’s aviaries at Black River (where the Pink pigeon is also kept) and three males and seven females were brought to Jersey. From these we have reared ninety babies and have established satellite colonies in both Great Britain and America. We have now bred enough to think of reintroduction. But where to?