Above picture: Pamela Isdell loved Africa and its natural environments, supporting many conservation initiatives across the continent, including the Mouse-Free Marion Project; photograph by Mark Anderson
Pamela Anne Isdell passed away in Atlanta, USA, on 18 March 2025 at the age of 79, after a long battle against cancer. She had returned from her Cape Town home a few days earlier so that she could be with her family. Born in Scotland, but brought up in Zambia from an early age, she developed an abiding love for Africa and for its wildlife and natural habitats. Her love was expressed by her philanthropy that supported many environmental causes. One of these was Saving Marion Island’s Seabirds. The Mouse-Free Marion (MFM) Project. Pamela became an early member of the project’s prestigious ‘Wandering Albatross Club’ by sponsoring 150 hectares, a category that still has only 22 members who have sponsored 100 ha or more as listed on the MFM Honour Roll.
Pamela’s support of the MFM Project did not stop with her becoming a hectare sponsor. Her most recent donation of US$ 500 000 through the Isdell Family Foundation was received only this month. This impressive grant has given the project a major boost to its fund-raising effort and is hugely appreciated by the whole MFM Project Team.
Pamela and Neville Isdell during a visit to the Kalahari in 2020; photograph by Mark Anderson
Pamela’s support of bird conservation in South Africa extended to funding efforts to save the African Penguin, recently recategorized as Critically Endangered, with extinction in the wild predicted for as early as 2035. She supported research by BirdLife South Africa (of which she was both a Honorary and a Golden Bird Patron) by sponsoring the Pamela Isdell Fellow of Penguin Conservation, a position currently held by Christina Hagen. Pamela’s and her family’s support for Birdlife South Africa extended further, funding vulture research, supporting staff positions and the acquisition and renovation of the NGO’s two offices, the headquarters in Johannesburg, named Isdell House, and more recently in Cape Town (where the MFM Project has its own headquarters).
From left: Neville and Pamela Isdell, Christina Hagen, Mark and Tania Anderson and Peter Hagen hold African Penguin decoys at the mainland translocation site in the De Hoop Nature Reserve
Pamela also was a long-time supporter of the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) that works to improve the conservation status of the African Penguin. Most recently, she funded the Pamela Isdell Penguin Nursery (as it is to be named), currently under construction at SANCCOB’s facilities to hatch abandoned eggs and rear nestlings that are then returned to the world as healthy juveniles. As a fellow SANCCOB Board Member I only met Pamela in person once, when she hosted the board to a pleasant lunch in a seaside hotel. I sat next to her, and we chatted about penguin conservation and my experiences studying these birds on Dassen Island in the early 1970s. Most of our board meetings were online, with Pamela joining us from the UK, USA or Zambia (she was an inveterate traveller), when I noted her careful questioning on the agenda items and carrying out her fiduciary duties with knowledge and care.
On the very day of her passing came the news of an out-of-court settlement reached between the purse-seine fishing industry and BirdLife South Africa and SANCCOB that will legally protect foraging grounds around six key breeding islands of the threatened penguin. She would have been so pleased to have known about this positive outcome for penguins, as it was something she had followed closely during meetings of the SANCCOB Board.
Just a few days before she left South Africa for the last time, Mark Anderson, CEO of Birdlife South Africa, Chair of the MFM Project Management Committee and a close friend, was able to visit Pamela and say goodbye before she returned to Atlanta.
In the week preceding her sad passing, Mark sent Pamela and Neville a photograph of a commissioned bronze sculpture of a Wandering Albatross by Robbie Leggat to thank her and husband Neville on behalf of the MFM Project for their generous support. They had decided that the sculpture should be kept at their Cape Town home, as this is where Pamela fell in love with African Penguins and hence started her support for BirdLife South Africa’s conservation work. Mark will deliver the sculpture to Neville when he is next in Cape Town.
The bronze sculpture of a Wandering Albatross presented to the Isdell Family Foundation by the Mouse-Free Marion Project. The plaque has an inscription by HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, the Royal Patron of the MFM Project; photograph by Mark Anderson
In a touching tribute, Mark has written “The world has just lost a remarkable person. Pamela was an exceptionally kind and humble individual who cared deeply for her family and friends, for Africa’s natural environment, and especially for African Penguins. Pamela entered my life around the time of my mother’s passing, and for the past 12 years, she has filled that maternal role in many ways. We spoke regularly – hardly a few days passed without us WhatsApping, emailing, or chatting on the phone. I was fortunate to share time with her in Canada, the UK, the Kalahari, and across South Africa. A few weeks ago, I visited her in Cape Town to say goodbye. She held my hand at lunch, hugged me tightly when we said goodbye, and we both shed tears. Her legacy of conservation and philanthropy will continue to inspire and protect the natural world she so dearly loved.”
As well as her interest in bird conservation spread over three continents, Pamela was also active in supporting animal welfare and the rehabilitation of woodlands and grasslands in Africa, UK and the USA. She, along with her husband Neville (a former chairperson of World Wildlife Fund-US), was a supporter of the Peace Parks Foundation and The Nature Conservancy. Pamela was also a member of the Birdlife International Advisory Group which she helped set up. In 2024, WWF South Africa gave Pamela and Neville jointly the WWF Living Planet Award for their life-long contributions to people and nature. Truly a life well lived!
Anton Wolfaardt, MFM Project Manager, writes: “Pamela’s generosity and steadfast dedication to conservation have left a lasting legacy, not only for the MFM Project but on global efforts to safeguard seabirds and their habitats. Her unwavering belief in our project was evident in her exceptional support – both as an early hectare sponsor and through her most recent transformative donation. Her legacy will live on in the improved conservation status of the seabirds she so passionately championed”.
The MFM Project is deeply grateful for her contributions and extends its heartfelt condolences to Pamela’s husband and fellow conservationist of 55 years Neville, daughter Cara Isdell-Lee, son-in-law Zak Lee and grandson Rory on their loss of a special person. Ave Atque Vale, Pamela.
With thanks to Denise Landau, Friends of South Georgia Island for help with the transferral of funds donated by the Isdell Family Foundation from the USA to South Africa.
John Cooper, News Correspondent, Mouse-Free Marion Project. 25 March 2025
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At risk to mice? A Salvin’s Prion rests among Blechnum ferns on Marion Island by Georgia Feild of Artists & Biologists Unite for Nature (ABUN) for the Mouse-Free Marion Project; after a photograph by Michelle Risi
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.
