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176 IGUANA  •  VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3  •  SEPTEMBER 2004 WILSON

Rick van Veen was born the son of a Dutch father and an
Australian mother in upstate New York on 27 June 1967.

Rick’s stint in the U.S. was short-lived, as the family moved to
Australia when he was five months old. There, in the herp-rich
outback, an extraordinary herper was born. At age four, Rick
brought home his first snake, a venomous Copperhead
(Austrelaps superbus) that he had usurped from a Kookaburra.
That snake didn’t bite Rick, but others did — included was a
Sea Snake (Enhydrina schistosa), a Spotted Black Snake
(Pseudechis guttata), a Tiger Snake (Notechis scutatus), a Brown

Snake (Pseudonaja textilis), and half a dozen “lesser” elapids.
The Brown Snake incident resulted in Rick being in a coma for
48 hours — an ordeal that left him with some lingering liver
and kidney problems, as well as some apparent neurological
anomalies (see below). Fittingly, Rick would later serve as an
instructor on snake handling techniques for the Queensland
Department of Environment; perhaps more appropriately, he
also served as an instructor on snakebite first aid.

Rick’s educational and work history reflect a man who has
followed his dreams, and they have been varied. Says Rick: “If
it ain’t fun, I ain’t doing it.” Of course, Rick’s idea of fun is
somewhat different from what most people would regard as
even bearable. Remarks one of Rick’s former Australian
employers: “Rick’s exploits in the field are legendary… He actu-
ally seems to enjoy the sorts of conditions that most people
would find downright unbearable.” One could not get a better
recommendation for prospective work in the harsh Hellshire
Hills of Jamaica. Indeed, Rick quickly attained legendary sta-
tus in Jamaica. Also, those of us who work with him soon came
to realize that, when Rick suggests some seemingly insane and
undoable course of action, he is usually serious — and, then,
invariably produces. For example, Rick has been parlaying his
masonry skills into converting our humble stick research sta-
tion into a veritable rock fortress, an exercise that requires him
to carry 90-lb bags of cement into the interior forest, not to
mention other bulky or heavy construction materials.

After early stints as a brick layer and horticulturist, Rick
focused full-time on pursuing a career in field biology and con-
servation — a career that has extended, literally, from the equa-
tor to the Antarctic. During this time, Rick also completed a
BSc degree in Botany/Zoology at James Cook University in
Queensland. Rick’s employment history has included seven
years working for the Queensland National Parks research
branch on crocodiles, sea turtles, and endangered macropods
(kangaroos, etc.); more to the south, he worked on pack-ice seal
surveys with the Tasmania/Australia Antarctic Division, and
studied the feeding ecology of Macaroni Penguins on Heard
Island. Rick gained additional animal handling skills working
for a variety of Australian wildlife parks, including the
Curumbin Wildlife Sanctuary, the Healesville Wildlife
Sanctuary, and the Ballarat Wildlife & Reptile Park.

More recently, Rick worked as resident naturalist at the
Pajinka Wilderness Lodge on the Cape York Peninsula, and,
from 2002–2003, served as coordinator for the Pompuraaw

P R O F I L E

Rick van Veen on Heard Island, contemplating work closer to the
equator. Photograph by Tony Dorr.

Rick van Veen: 
A Feral Mammal’s Worst Nightmare

Byron Wilson

Department of Life Sciences
University of the West Indies, Mona

Kingston 7, Jamaica



IGUANA  •  VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3  •  SEPTEMBER 2004 177RICK VAN VEEN

Aboriginal Land & Sea Management Centre. These latter posi-
tions involved significant feral animal control work — experi-
ences that uniquely prepared Rick for front line duties in the
Hellshire Hills. For example, Rick participated in the “control”
(i.e., with extreme prejudice) of thousands of wild pigs — pro-
viding the training that has made him the uncontested wild
boar king on the Jamaican Iguana project. The rest of us remain
humble pretenders.

Oddly, Rick has long had a love for iguanas; odd because
he grew up in a country devoid of iguanas despite harboring
one of the world’s richest and most dramatic lizard faunas.
Whatever the explanation for his fascination with iguanas, in
2000, Rick was able to whet his appetite by assisting with veg-
etation surveys and dietary analyses of the Fijian Crested Iguana
at the Yandua-tabu Island Iguana Conservation Reserve.
Determined to become fully immersed in iguana work, Rick
traveled to the U.S. in 2003, passing by the Fort Worth Zoo en
route to attending the annual IUCN Iguana Specialist Group
meeting in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Fortunately, Rick
Hudson, a conservation biologist at Fort Worth, saw Hellshire
written all over van Veen and cleverly pointed him south,
toward the Jamaican Iguana project.

Funds to hire Rick came initially from grants from the
Miami Metrozoo and the Audubon Zoo. These were desig-
nated for a 3-month pitfall trap survey and associated mammal
control experiment in the core iguana area. This project
involved spending periods of over a month in the remote inte-
rior of the Hellshire Hills, and a trap-checking regimen that
entailed walking the equivalent distance of the entire peninsula
every day for the 48-day census period. Rick began capturing
and observing iguanas during this time, and quickly established
that he was just the sort of biologist who could work happily
and productively in Hellshire’s interior forest. A grant from
Conservation International and the efforts of the International
Iguana Foundation have secured funding to retain Rick’s talents
through 2004, and a major effort is now being directed at
obtaining funds to keep him in Jamaica for the remainder of
his natural life (see www.IguanaFoundation.org).

Next on the agenda for Rick is a radio-telemetry study that
will involve attaching transmitters to 20 hatchling iguanas dur-
ing the September (2004) hatching period. This endeavor will

yield critical ecological data on the most vulnerable, but poorly
known life history stage of the species. Indeed, aside from obvi-
ously high mortality rates resulting from predation by exotic
mammals, virtually nothing is known about the habitat prefer-
ences, activity patterns, and movement ecology of young igua-
nas. Rick’s skill and demonstrated dedication will no doubt
ensure that this project will come to fruition. Radio-tracking
wild adults, especially post-partum females, is planned for the
2005 nesting season. That effort will help delineate the extent
and characteristics of the habitat used by wild iguanas during
the non-nesting portions of the year.

Aside from the continued monitoring of both wild and
headstarted iguanas in the core conservation zone, Rick’s par-
ticipation will also enable us to embark on other high priority
projects that have long awaited implementation. For example,
survey work in the early 1990s identified a population of igua-
nas in the western Hellshire Hills that we have not been able to
revisit. We plan to assess the status of this forgotten population,
and will focus on the location and subsequent monitoring of
nesting sites. That activity will permit harvesting a new source
of wild hatchlings to provide fresh genetic material for the cap-
tive population. At present, all captives are derived from a hand-
ful of females that nest at two known communal nesting areas
in central Hellshire. Additional nesting areas obviously exist. An
infusion of new genetic variation will be a boon to the existing
zoo population that now serves as a hedge against extinction —

Up close and personal with an Elephant Seal: Rick pondering the 
wisdom of working on subjects that outweigh him by an order of
magnitude. Photograph by Tony Dorr.

Rick processing a Jamaican Iguana in the Hellshire Hills.



178 IGUANA  •  VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3  •  SEPTEMBER 2004 WILSON

and as a source of headstarters for use in on-going and future
repatriation exercises.

Unfortunately, the future outlook for the iguana in the
Hellshire Hills does not look bright. The plethora of invasive
species (e.g., dogs, cats, rats, mongooses, pigs) will never be
eradicated — only controlled through labor-intensive trapping
efforts that will be difficult to maintain in both the short and
long term. In addition, illegal logging activities continue to
erode the remaining natural forest and pose a security risk to
iguana project personnel. Thus, while the preservation of the
Hellshire Hills ecosystem is an objective that must be pursued,
the only realistic strategy for ensuring the iguana’s survival in
the wild is the creation of an off-shore population on the Goat
Islands. Lying just off the western edge of the Hellshire
Peninsula, Great Goat Island in particular has long been recog-
nized as an ideal site for the re-establishment of an iguana pop-
ulation. The island could easily be rendered pest free and iguana
friendly, and the prospects for effective, long-term management
would be enhanced by economic and logistic feasibility.

Encouragingly, the bureaucratic issues that have histori-
cally prevented the initiation of a Goat Island restoration and
iguana re-introduction program appear to be approaching res-
olution. Both the Hellshire Hills and the Goat Islands have

been accorded protected area status since 1999, as part of the
Portland Bight Protected Area. The government of Jamaica is
now taking steps to ensure that appropriate management
instruments will be instituted to conserve these national treas-
ures. If all goes well, such a rehabilitation program will become
a reality in the near future — and Rick van Veen is the obvious
candidate to lead such a crucial field campaign. Rick is not only
the right person to launch an assault on the Goat Islands, but
has already indicated his enthusiasm for remaining in Jamaica
and dedicating himself to the effort.

In summary, Rick’s participation in the Jamaican Iguana
project has been of incalculable value. Aside from running the
field program in Hellshire, he has infused new life into both the
local project and the international donor community. In short,
Rick has provided the impetus for a renewed thrust to study
and conserve the Jamaican Iguana and its unique but critically
imperiled ecosystem. He also has made the project a more
entertaining enterprise for the rest of us participants. Although
clearly comfortable with a hermit’s solitude, Rick is a gregari-
ous sort whose consistent good humor and contagious enthu-
siasm have been an invigorating influence at all levels of the
project. In particular, for those of us who love wild pig meat,
Rick has improved the quality of our lives in such a dramatic
fashion, we often find ourselves embarrassingly grateful.

A reflective Rick van Veen, holding a freshly caught Jamaican Iguana
in the Hellshire Hills.

Rick van Veen at the research station "South Camp," in the central
Hellshire Hills. Photograph by Dawn Fleuchaus.

Rick surveying a job well done: a dead mongoose that was trapped and
removed from the core Jamaican iguana conservation zone. 


