Trust celebrates Gerald Durrell's 100th birthday

Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust has celebrated its late founder's 100th birthday.

It has begun marking author and naturalist Gerald Durrell's birthday with a year of events, including an installation of wildflowers at Jersey Zoo, a gala ball and a commemorative plaque.

Mr Durrell founded Jersey Zoo in 1959 with an aim to save species from extinction, and later set up the charitable trust in 1963.

Mr Durrell's wife and honorary trust director Lee said she wanted to use the year to talk about the important conservation work he did, some of which the world still "doesn't realise".

Mrs Durrell said: "It's taken a long time for people to wake up to environmental issues.

"Gerry was one of the pioneers in telling people about it, but still people don't know, don't realise the extent of the depths to which the planet has got its problems, environmentally speaking."

She said she hoped the events in 2025 would get more people to think about environmental problems and climate change and they would then "do something about it".

Speaking about her late husband, Mrs Durrell said he was a "larger than life character" with a "megawatt" personality.

"He would get so angry at things, I mean particularly environmental things, the way people were plundering the planet, but it [his passion] was always a great energetic thing to be around and that's certainly something you miss."

On Tuesday, Mrs Durrell unveiled a plaque honouring her husband at Manor House, where he lived within the grounds of Jersey Zoo.

Mrs Durrell was joined by close friends and special guests.

She said she was "utterly convinced" the board would remember Mr Durrell's legacy.

Mr Durrell was born in India in 1925.

He spent some of his childhood in Corfu, which he talks about in his book My Family and Other Animals.

He started working with zoos, and during his travels became concerned about the problems facing wildlife.

He became interested in zoo-led conservation.

Through his writing, he raised enough money to create his own zoo to try to save species from extinction.

Mr Durrell died in 1995 and a few years later the trust was named the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust to honour his contribution to conservation.

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