The Réserve Africaine de Sigean is located in the communes of Sigean and Peyriac-de-Mer. It owns almost 350 ha. The animal park itself covers 142 ha. The rest of the properties, spread around the business site, are made up of a variety of environments: 200 hectares of fallow land, scrubland, pinewoods, wet meadows, sansouires and several kilometers of riparian vegetation.

This great variety of environments, combined with the attractiveness of large herds of herbivorous mammals and gatherings of several thousand birds, has resulted in remarkable native biodiversity throughout the site. It is home to the department’s largest heronry, high concentrations of Bee-eaters and Crested Pochards, remarkable insects such as the Diana and a wide variety of chiropterans.

The Réserve Africaine de Sigean has teamed up with two nature protection associations to carry out fauna and flora inventories in 2018: Aude Claire and the LPO de l’Aude.

The surveys covered the following classes: birds, mammals, insects (lepidopterans, odonates, orthopterans), reptiles and amphibians. All the flora has also been catalogued.

At the end of this survey, an ecologically responsible management plan for the Réserve Africaine de Sigean was proposed, with the aim of preserving this natural animal and plant heritage and why not see the return of certain species that were not found during the inventories.

The Aude Claire Federation

The Aude Claire federation is a 1901 environmental protection association recognized as being in the public interest. Its main objectives are to contribute to knowledge of the natural spaces and biological species present in its area of action. It implements a policy of protecting outstanding natural areas.

The Federation contributes to site management, but also informs and raises public awareness.

Further information www.audeclaire.org

It operates in the Aude river watershed departments of Ariège, Aude, Haute Garonne, Hérault, Pyrénées-Orientales and Tarn.

The main activities of the Aude Claire federation are :

  • Research and studies on natural environments and species of flora and fauna
  • Site development and management consultancy
  • Environmental education

LPO de l’Aude

Based between Narbonne and Gruissan, the LPO Aude is an association under the French law of 1901 for the protection of nature and the environment, working to conserve birds and their habitats, raise public awareness and promote sustainable management of the environment in support of biodiversity as a whole. To preserve the Aude’s extraordinary natural heritage, its naturalists, both salaried and voluntary, experts and novices, travel the length and breadth of the département to observe, inventory and implement management and conservation measures favorable to the region’s biodiversity.

Further information https://aude.lpo.fr