Cuba

In April 2014, I found myself self-shooting a wildlife expedition film in the Cuban Forests of the Isle of Youth, Cuba's lesser known land mass. The forests in the south of this Island are almost completely uninhabited and are the last remaining habitats of their kind. Very few people have ever been there and as a result, the wildlife is largely unrecorded. Unfortunately the habitat is listed as Critical/Endangered and is facing a number of threats. 

Luckily, Dr David Bird from the University of the West of England has been granted special access for the past 7 years. With his final year undergraduates students, he meets up with Havanas finest biologists to capture and document everything that lives there, in order to develop a conservation strategy to ensure the future of this pristine island paradise. 

My job as a filmmaker was a great challenge. With intense heat, salt, sand and insects doing their best to get the better of me and my equipment, I followed the team as they searched for new species. The expedition was a huge success with many surprises showing up, to the delight of Dave and the team.  

We are still waiting to hear back from the Natural History Museum of Cuba to determine whether or not the two potential new species found are new to science.