Members of the Mouse-Free Marion Mountain Walkers about to start a 16-km run/walk from Constantia Nek around the five dams on the plateau of Table Mountain and back on 30 November 2025. From left: John Cooper, MFM Project News Correspondent, with supporters Hazel Mbewu, Sarah and Peter Brooke and Colette Rahme Borain
In order to increase awareness and from time to time raise funds (as well as attempting to keep fit) the Saving Marion Island’s Seabirds: The Mouse-Free Marion (MFM) Project instituted two activity groups in late 2024 and 2025. Members wear MFM Project clothing while exercising by cycling, running and walking. The Mouse-Free Marion Cycling and Mouse-Free Marion Walkers groups are made up of Project team members and ambassadors who enjoy exercising outdoors while “spreading the word” in their MFM Project-branded cycling jerseys and activity shirts – which feature a flying Wandering Albatross on their backs. The two groups, currently with roughly 50 members between them (with some overlap), stay in touch via WhatsApp. They meet up for bike rides around the Cape Peninsula and excursions on foot, often on the slopes of Cape Town’s iconic Table Mountain, that forms part of a National Park and World Heritage Site, as well as elsewhere within South Africa.
During the end-of-year holiday break group members sent in their photographs to MFM News to express their best wishes and thanks to the many Project supporters for the year ahead. A selection of these pictures follows.
Mouse-Free Marion Project Manager Anton Wolfaardt takes a selfie during a solo run along the Stanford Wandelpad/Walking Trail near his home in the Western Cape’s Overberg District.
Jeremy George and John Cooper acting as bike marshals for the 47th running of the “Medical 10” running and walking race for health professionals over ten kilometres around the Rondebosch Common National Monument and Conservation Area on 23 November 2025.
Tania and Mark Anderson on one of their regular daily walks, on this occasion for eight kilometres along the Braamfontein Spruit, a river in South Africa’s Gauteng Province on 29 December 2025. Mark is the CEO of BirdLife South Africa. He is also a member of the MFM NPC Board and Chair of the MFM Project Management Committee.
Keen cyclists and runners Leandri de Kock and Arend de Beer hiking in their MFM activity shirts at Monks Cowl in the transnational Maloti-Drakensberg Park World Heritage Site during the holiday period.
Too cold to wear! Camilla Smyth (2023/24 MFM Project field assistant and current seal field assistant) and Vonica Perold (2025/26 MFM Project field assistant) wish all MFM Project supporters a Happy New Year as they display the back of an activity shirt on Marion Island while checking a mouse-trapping in the island’s inland polar desert on 31 December 2025. Photograph by Roelf Daling (2025/26 MFM field assistant)
Brazilian immigrants to South Africa Eduardo Bicudo and Thelma Marques smile for the camera in their MFM activity shirts while walking along the Muizenberg beach front on the Cape Peninsula’s False Bay on 24 December 2025
Hard-sand cycling demonstrated by Tim Timmerman along the shore of Langebaan Lagoon, a Ramsar Wetland Reserve of International Importance and part of the West Cape National Park, in October 2025
Heading south. Michelle Risi, John Cooper and Chris Jones at the Cape Town International Airport on 26 November before Michelle flew to South America to join an Antarctic cruise ship as a guide for the summer. Michelle and Chris are valued long-term ambassadors for the MFM Project, supporting it with their many photographs and posters of Marion Island’s threatened seabirds
As well as the MFM shirts and jerseys, project-branded “merch” available in 2025 has included socks, neck buffs and gaiters. Wonder what’s next for 2026, maybe caps, bush hats or beanies for the hot (and sometimes cold) weather we encounter while staying fit in support of the MFM Project?
Contact the Project via info@mousefreemarion.org if you are interested in joining one of its exercise groups or obtaining (and wearing!) an activity shirt or cycling jersey.
John Cooper, News Correspondent, Mouse-Free Marion Project, 14 January 2026
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With Wandering Albatrosses on their backs, Alan and Tessa Wood look out on the distant Western Cape mountains from Paarl, a historic town in the Cape Winelands
The Mouse-Free Marion Project is a registered non-profit company (No. 2020/922433/08) in South Africa, established to eradicate the invasive albatross-killing mice on Marion Island in the Southern Ocean. The project was initiated by BirdLife South Africa and the South African Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment. Upon successful completion, the project will restore the critical breeding habitat of over two million seabirds, many globally threatened, and improve the island’s resilience to a warming climate. For more information or to support the project please visit mousefreemarion.org.
