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‘Special status’ bid for park

http://www.iol.co.za/scitech/science/environment/special-status-bid-for-park-1.1559775

August 9 2013 at 09:00am By JOHN YELD

Cape Town – Cape Town is applying to have parts of its False Bay Ecology Park declared a Ramsar Site, or wetland of international importance.

The hoped-for designation will be made under the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands that came into force for South Africa on December 21, 1975, and will help protect the park that is centred on the water bodies of Zeekoevlei, Rondevlei and the Cape Flats Waste Water Treatment Works (or Strandfontein sewerage works, as they’re also known).

This core area has already been declared an Important Bird Area (IBA), where at least 168 different bird species have been recorded. Of these, 76 are freshwater wetland bird species and a further 18 are coastal species that visit the area to roost or breed.

At least 45 water bird species breed here, and the park is considered the fifth most important IBA for wetland birds, supporting more birds in numbers and species than Lake St Lucia, which is some 350 times bigger.

The decision to apply for Ramsar status was taken by the City at last week’s monthly council meeting, with councillors agreeing that advantages would include increased tourism and local economic development, and increased funding opportunities for wetland protection.

There are currently 168 contracting parties to the convention, named for the Iranian city of Ramsar on the bird-rich shores of the Caspian Sea where the convention was adopted in February, 1971.

BIRDS OF A FEATHER: Some of the birds in a flock of Greater Flamingos on the Black River near the Rondebosch golf course.

Its official name is “The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance especially as Waterfowl Habitat” but it is popularly known simply as the Ramsar Convention.

South Africa currently has 21 designated Ramsar sites, with a total surface area of 554 136ha.

Just five of these are in the Western Cape: the De Hoop Vlei near Bredasdorp; De Mond (Heuningnes Estuary) near Struisbaai; Langebaan Lagoon; Verlorenvlei at Elands Bay on the West Coast; and the Wilderness Lakes.

Evaporation ponds and pans at well-managed sewerage treatment works are providing increasingly valuable habitat for many birds as natural areas are swallowed up by urban development.

This has also become apparent at the Athlone Waste Water Treatment Works which lie in the heart of sprawling suburbia.

Until now, this area has been off-limits to the public, but a new initiative that started recently could see parts of it being opened up for birders.

In the meantime, the first of what will be regular monthly bird counts was done by volunteers who included Cape Bird Club members.

“The treatment works have recently dredged all the ponds at their facility,” explained Cliff Dorse, biodiversity co-ordinator in the city’s environmental resource management department.

“The ponds were completely choked with senescent reedbeds and alien plants. Since they’ve been cleared, there is an impressive diversity of birds which are now using and visiting the site.

“The staff are very keen to manage the area in a way that will enhance the habitat for birds and birders.

“They have also erected an impressive security fence around the ponds so visitors are safe.

“While the end goal is to open the site up for regular visitors who will be able to just sign in at the gate, this may take a few months as they are busy completing an internal fence.”

Dorse organised the first count at the Athlone works, and overall his team recorded 687 birds covering 45 species.

In the North Ponds, they counted 141 birds of 15 species, of which the Hartlaub’s Gull was dominant (79). In the South Ponds there were 229 from 13 species, with the Black-winged Stilt dominant (179); in the Central works area there were 232 from 12 species, with the Hartlaub’s Gull again dominant (192); while in the Black River section they recorded 85 from 12 species, where the Black-winged Stilt was also dominant (36).

“The inaugural count was rather successful and we had a total of 45 species. Highlights were 12 Lesser Flamingo, an African Black Duck, Peregrine Falcon and Rufous-chested Sparrowhawk overhead,” he told the team later.

The Athlone works is also important in environmental terms because treated water is released into the Black River system. The higher the quality of the treated water, the better the ecological health of the lower reaches of this river. And this year, the river has been in much better shape.

This is because of a clean-up managed in partnership between the city and the Natural Resource Management Programme (Working for Water) as part of an overall improvement project – the Kader Asmal integrated catchment management programme, established in honour of the late Professor Kader Asmal under whose leadership the national Working for Water programme was founded.

The river cleaning also formed part of the mayor’s Special Job Creation Project which focuses on helping those residents in the city most in need of income, while also enhancing service delivery and improving the quality of water.

The increasing birdlife in the river – and particularly the N2/M5 commuter-pleasing appearance of substantial numbers of Greater Flamingos and a few of the locally much rarer Lesser Flamingos in recent months – is testimony to the success of this initiative.