Saturday, September 19, 2009

Into the Wild

I arrived at the park last Sunday, so I have been here for almost 1 week. Im glad to be here, travelling was getting starting to become exhausting. The weather here is quite different than the other parts of Bolivia and Brazil I had been in. Its normally between 80-90 degrees during the day and 70-80 at night so its pretty hot! But there are practically no mosquitoes - a miracle. You dont even need long sleeves when you're out in the jungle and its no longer neccesary to wear three pairs of pants :) I started working with Engine, a male ocelot a few days ago. Working with Engine is definatly a challenge, he is completely different than Vanesso (the ocelot I worked with last time I was here). He is one of the few cats who would have been a great canidate for releasing but the zoo who gave him to the park forced them to sign legal documents promising they would never release him :( so for his first few years at the park no one could get close enough to him to walk him and he never left his cage. Now, after a few long term volunteers worked really hard on getting a collar and carabiner on him he is able to walk his trails. When I got here I found out that Vanesso had escaped for almost 2 weeks and was still missing. So for the first few days we set traps and luckilly he returned to his volunteer when she was sleeping out in the jungle by his cage. I also got to go and visit one of the jaguars one afternoon and it still amazes me how beautiful they are. I took pictures but its impossible to capture what it is like to see one up close in its natural habitat. I didnt bring my camera to town this week because the internet is quite slow but next week I will try to upload a few pictures. Miss you all!

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