Biologist Professor Carl Jones has probably saved more species of animal from extinction than anyone else. Growing up in Carmarthenshire, Wales, one of his earliest memories is hearing an owl hoot. In 1979, at the age of 24, Jones went to Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean, to help save the Mauritius kestrel from extinction. There were only four individual birds left in the wild, yet he worked to grow their population to 400. He has also saved five other species of bird, three species of reptile, a fruit bat and several plants. In an interview with The Guardian, Jones said, “My headmaster always used to say, ‘Why don’t you do proper work instead of playing with the birds in your back garden?’ Deep down in my heart, I…
