Our Staff

Cielo Figuerola

Island Restoration Specialist

Cielo conducted her graduate work on Mona Island and focused on the Mona Island Rock Iguana, looking at differences in habitat use and reproduction in this species. Cielo owes her interest and enthusiasm for both reptiles and amphibians to a summer internship in the Costa Rican rainforest working with Poison Dart Frogs and Freshwater Turtles. She started working with Island Conservation in 2012 as part of the Desecheo Island restoration efforts and since then has supported several projects, including Mona, Monito, and Desecheo islands, and atolls in the Pacific such as Palmyra, Midway, and Wake. As a field biologist, she has spent over 15 years working in conservation and restoration efforts in Caribbean islands focusing on rare and endangered flora and fauna species, invasive species impacts and distribution, and more specifically, on the Recovery Program for the Mona Island Rock Iguana, an endangered species severely impacted by invasive vertebrates on the island. Cielo has also been actively engaged in initiatives from the Iguana Specialist Group (IUCN) and Kew Gardens: Millennium Seedbank Partnership in the UK, collaborating in their current projects. Cielo is based in Puerto Rico, where, in her free time, she enjoys scuba diving, music, photography, hiking, and traveling.