Eco-Center Caput Insulae – Beli, Research and Educational Center for the Protection of Nature is a non-profit and non-governmental organization whose mission is to preserve natural diversity, indigenous values and cultural-historical heritage of the island of Cres. The Association operates for 18 years and so far we have successfully conducted a number of projects.
Fundamental part of Eco-centre’s work includes integral protection of endangered and protected species – Eurasian Griffon vultures. In cooperation with the Ornithological station Cres and Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences, we follow the population of these birds on Kvarner islands’ colonies. We ring Griffons, mark them with wing tags and track their migration routes in Europe, Asia and Africa. We conduct regular and supplemental feeding of the population of vultures at permanent feeding stations (“vulture restaurants”). On the island of Cres, there are about 80 nesting pairs, and by today we ringed and marked more than 760 Griffons (wing-tagd, metal and green plastic rings, and satellite GPS transmitter). Eco-centre has a special role in rescuing young Griffons that fall into the sea because of unfortunate set of circumstances, and the ones which are found sick, injured or poisoned. Within our complex in Beli we established a Rescue center for Griffon vultures where we treat injured vultures until they are ready to be released in the nature (generally after one year).
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