A new land reserve is being established in the area of Ragged Beach to further protect the Witless Bay Ecological Reserve bird populations from potential impacts of future development. Eighty-two per cent of all of North America’s puffins breed around the coastline of Newfoundland and Labrador.

The Witless Bay Ecological Reserve has North America’s largest colony of Atlantic Puffins with over 600,000 breeding birds, and is located one to two kilometres offshore from the Ragged Beach area.

As a result of the reserve, new development of Crown land in that area will be restricted. This will ensure that light pollution in the Ragged Beach area is minimized and protections are enhanced for the Atlantic Puffin and Leach’s Storm Petrel populations of the nearby Witless Bay Ecological ReservE.