Above Picture: Peter Ryan at sea in his natural habitat
Professor Peter Geoffrey Ryan, Director since 2014 of the FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology at the University of Cape Town, was awarded BirdLife South Africa’s Gill Memorial Medal at the organisation’s AGM, held virtually on 28 May 2022. Peter is the only South African A-rated ornithologist, an author and co-author of many bird books, including on seabirds (see below), and an accomplished bird photographer. He is an advisory member of the Mouse-Free Marion Project Non-Profit Company Board. He also serves as Chair of the MFM Scientific and Technical Advisory Group, where experience gained on his many research visits to Marion Island serves the project well.
The citation for Peter’s award says in part “He has made particularly important contributions to the fields of seabird ecology, marine plastic pollution and its impacts on seabirds, mitigation of seabird bycatch by fisheries, and evolution in oceanic island birds. Peter has also led important work on the systematics and phylogeography of continental African birds, and on the effects of energy infrastructure (such as wind turbines and power lines) on land birds.”
Peter Ryan also received the Gilchrist Memorial Medal of the South African Network for Coastal and Oceanic Research (SANCOR) in 2017 for his contributions to marine science and has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa. He is set to retire from the ‘Fitztitute’ at the end of the year. His citation, written by Claire Spottiswoode (herself a recipient of the Gill Memorial Medal), ends with stating that Peter “plans to remain active in research and, knowing him, we can be reassured that he will be more active than ever. As a community we will no doubt continue for decades to come to be inspired (and more than a little awed) by his knowledge, productivity, and insight.”
The Gill Memorial Medal is awarded for outstanding lifetime contributions to ornithology in southern Africa. The inaugural award was presented in 1960 and to date has been awarded 26 times; only four recipients can be said to have concentrated their studies on seabirds. Reflecting my advanced years, I am pleased to say I have known all 26 recipients, co-authoring scientific publications with a number of them over five decades. Surely most have been co-authored with Peter, who I have much valued as a colleague on many island field trips and a caring friend since his schoolboy days (when presciently I told him on a seabird island that one day he would become Director of the FitzPatrick Institute).
Selected Publications:
Ryan, P.G. (Ed.) 2007. A Field Guide to the Animals and Plants of Tristan da Cunha and Gough Island. Newbury: Pisces Publications. 162 pp. [ACAP review].
Ryan, P.[G.] 2017. Guide to Seabirds of Southern Africa. Cape Town: Struik Nature. 160 pp. [ACAP review].
John Cooper, News Correspondent, Mouse-Free Marion Project, 14 June 2022
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.
