The magazine of the photo-essay
September/October 2023 back issue
“A free, really high quality photo-essay magazine. Fabulous!”
Stephen Fry. British actor, writer and film maker
by Sally Mills
As I look back on my career in nature conservation, I feel extremely fortunate to have been able to follow my lifelong
passion for the natural world throughout my working life. Although filled with many remarkable experiences, one of the
exceptional highlights has to be when, after 25 years of conservation employment in the UK, my partner Melvyn and I
earned the opportunity to manage the prestigious Aride Island Nature Reserve in Seychelles. The unique experience of
living and working on a small, remote tropical island, for 2 years, with only six other human inhabitants, no electricity
or running water and an array of incredible wildlife was both cathartic and inspirational.
Orange hermit crab Aride’s south-facing beach provides egg-laying sites for green and hawksbill turtles, the sand-
covered ground is crawling with crabs, and it is home to the world’s highest density of skinks (a type of lizard), with over
one per square metre.
The best seat on the island -To avoid the mosquitoes and to take in the evening, we would sit on what felt like our own
private section of beach crest.
Preparing to launch the lightweight boat - Island life was a very physical one and extremely demanding on the body;
everything involved hard manual work, from pulling the boat up the beach to carrying water from the well.
Fairy tern chick - Aride had the largest fairy tern population in Seychelles, with over four thousand pairs. They lay just
one egg on the nub of a branch, and it still amazes me how they manage to successfully rear their young in such perilous
circumstances.
Time to relax - I sat on the beach to watch the waves. The sea was still very rough, and as the tide came in it was
compelling.
Freshly caught barracuda - Fishing was an essential part of providing fresh food, but it was also a very magical and
rewarding pastime.
Green turtle hatchling on the way to the sea.
Rough seas eroded the beach to leave rocks which made boat work hazardous.
Lesser noddy egg - Of very simple construction, lesser noddy nests often appeared in peculiar and precarious places;
draped over branches like floppy, wet chamois leathers, they adorned the trees like Christmas decorations.
Sooty terns disturbed by poachers.
Picasso triggerfish – Snorkelling off the coast of Aride was superb.
Sunset off Aride beach.
