Seawilding runners-up in global award

Seawilding, the marine charity based at Loch Craignish, has narrowly missed out on a global award for it work on restoring the loch to its former glory.

 

The organisation was a finalist in the Local Hero category of the Ocean Awards, held in partnership with the Blue Marine Foundation, the winners of which were announced last week.

 

The Ocean Awards celebrate the achievements of individuals, groups and organisations from around the world dedicated to restoring the health of the oceans.

 

A panel of judges had the unenviable task of whittling down 94 entries to just 23 finalists.

 

The Local Hero Award award recognises the individual or group that has had the most positive impact on the marine environment within their local community this year.

 

Founded by Danny Renton, Seawilding is a pioneering, community-led charity working to restore degraded inshore marine habitats.

 

It is using the knowledge and input of the local community to restore the sea loch to its former glory.

 

Loch Craignish was once home to vast seagrass meadows, oyster reefs, beds of blue mussels and horse mussels, shoals of salmon and a carpet of brittle stars

 

However, the ecosystem has suffered decades of destructive scallop dredging and excess nutrients from agricultural runoff.

 

Seawilding was established with the aim of bringing back the biodiversity that has been lost within living memory and beyond through hands-on restoration of priority marine features.

 

Seawilding’s flagship projects are to restore one million European native oysters and 80 hectares of seagrass meadow in Loch Craignish.

 

With the help of scores of volunteers, Seawilding has so far grown and reintroduced 300,000 native oysters (1.7 tonnes) and reseeded 0.5 hectares of seagrass using a variety of experimental techniques.

 

Up against Seawilding in the final shortlist were Iranian conservationist Mohsen Rezaie-Atagholipour  who, in 2018, launched Iran’s first shark and ray research conservation project; Las Chelemeras, a group of 18 women descending from the Maya who, since 2010, have worked to restore and protect their local mangrove forests in Mexico; and Kōrero o te `Ōrau, an environmental non-gorvnmental organisation (NGO) established in 2017, consisting of indigenous Cook Islanders passionate about protecting the culture, environment and natural resources of the nation.

 

The winners of the Local Hero award were the women of Las Chelemeras in the Yucatán Nature Reserve.