Giant Tortoises, Marine Iguanas and more…

… how Animal Balance’s work is saving the lives of more than just cats and dogs on the Galapagos

Most of you probably know that Animal Balance has been working on the Galapagos Islands for the past 20 years, with a goal of saving not only cats and dogs, but also preserving the fragile ecosystem and native flora and fauna on these magical islands.

For the past few months, we have been working on a new census project that is not directly related to veterinary medicine but is gathering information to help us make decisions about the way we deliver veterinary medicine on the islands over the next 20 years. It is a door-to-door census project which is gathering valuable data about the daily lives of pets living on the islands of San Cristobal and Isabela, Galapagos.

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to travel to the Galapagos to help implement the census project on both islands for the first three weeks.

While I was on the island of Isabela, I received a special invitation from our good friend and colleague, Dr. Marilyn Cruz DVM, to join her and a longtime staff member of the Galapagos National Park Service, as they ventured into the backcountry to learn more about how invasive species are impacting native flora and fauna like the marine iguana and giant tortoise.

Animal Balance has been working with the authorities on Isabela since we started working on the Galapagos in 2004, regularly collaborating with the National Park Service, the municipalities in both the main village and in the highlands, and the Agency for Biosecurity, to manage the dog and cat populations throughout the island. This is a massive undertaking as Isabela is the largest of all the Galapagos Islands (it is larger than all the other islands combined!). The main town area is populated by about 2,000 community members and a revolving door of tourists from around the world. There are neighborhoods surrounded by hostels and many restaurants. The highlands consist of six massive, active volcanoes, rural farmland and vast, rocky lava fields. They are essentially two completely different worlds which require very different population management strategies.

We left early in the morning and drove out to the National Park entrance. Cars are not allowed in the park except for official Park vehicles, and we drove all the way to the end of the road. We were lucky enough to see four or five giant tortoises along the way. They all looked healthy and happy, but we also saw evidence of feral hogs in their nesting area, which is a very bad sign. When we got to the end of the road, we got out and walked past the no entry sign down a dirt path for about a mile or so. I felt special at that moment, knowing I was going into an area that tourists were not allowed to go to.

We also saw evidence of wild horses, wild boars and dogs who are the offspring of hunting dogs who have escaped from their farms in the highlands and traveled into the National Park lands. Animal Balance will be working with assistance from Galapagos Conservancy to provide targeted spay/neuter services for the farming communities in the coming months to help prevent these dogs from ending up in the park. 

Our next stop was one of the tourist beaches in the park. There we were looking at the marine iguana populations. Sadly, the most obvious observation was that there were no baby iguanas, only large iguanas, which means something is eating the eggs and/or the baby iguanas. Seeing these prehistoric beings up close was amazing and something I will always treasure. Making eye contact with an 80-year-old tortoise on the Galapagos is an experience I can’t quite put into words.

This hike turned out to be an unforgettable experience, and such a good reminder for me that the work Animal Balance has been doing on Galapagos over the past 20 years is undoubtedly one of the reasons that the magnificent animals I was able to interact with that day are still here.

Although we didn’t see baby iguanas near the coastline on our hike, there is a thriving population of them at one of the busiest local beach bars, which is evidence that our programs are working to humanely control the population of cats and dogs in the urban areas. (see video!)

We are about halfway through the door-to-door survey and the information we have received is that almost 70% of the pets in the urban areas are sterilized. Furthermore, most people do not allow their pets to roam freely, but instead walk them on leash (most often leashes obtained at Animal Balance clinics!). Without the efforts of Animal Balance teams over the past 20 years providing not only spay/neuter, but also vaccinations, microchips, leashes, collars, parasite prevention, dog training and so much more, the people who live here would not have any resources to allow them to be responsible pet owners. The survival of species like the marine iguana and the giant tortoise hinge ever so precariously on community members taking action to protect their island. To preserve these fragile ecosystems, we must continue this work and we must do it in a way that empowers the community… so that the next generation can experience this magic too.

Megan Gram

Animal Balance