Introducing Becca

Hello!!! My name is Becca Smith. I am originally from Edinburgh, Scotland and I have recently moved to Paraguay to join the Para la Tierra team as the Primate Project Leader. I have been fascinated by wildlife my entire life and decided very early on that all I wanted to do was work with animals. In 2010 I finished my undergraduate degree in Zoology and after spending the majority of 2011 working in Namibia in a wildlife sanctuary I discovered that working with primates was my true calling and returned to university to take a Masters of Research in Primate Biology, Behaviour and Conservation. After graduating in September 2012 I travelled to Panama for an internship rehabilitating rescued mantled howler monkeys. I am very excited to be working in such a beautiful place and I think there are endless possibilities for the direction that the primate project can go in. I have spent most of my time so far being shown the ropes and the amazing work that has already been done in beginning to habituate the monkeys and organise the trail system by Amber and Brett. To begin with I aim to fully habituate and identify the monkeys so that behaviour studies can be carried out. I am hoping to possibly extend the trail system into the parts of the reserve that, at present, have no trails or the trails are extremely overgrown. My more long term goals are to attempt to establish whether or the capuchins at Laguna Blanca are a distinct sub-species and also create a definite map of their home range and determine whether there are other troops in the area that they are breeding with. Right now I am just excited to be part of the very welcoming team at Para la Tierra and hope I can contribute to the project during my time here!! So if your into science, monkeys or just working in the sunshine in a beautiful setting why don’t you come down and join me!!! Becca

The epic saga of Berendan Wasp slayer

I left Melbourne, Australia on the 3rd of November. Saying goodbye to my family and heading off into the unknown of South America where no Slade had ever been before. The trip was an epic one leaving at 11 in the morning and arriving in Los Angeles at 9 in the morning of the same day. Wait what? A fourteen hour plane trip and I had gone back three hours in time. I spent all day at LA airport and then headed off another plane trip to Panama City, Panama. I spent another five hours reading before setting off on the last plane leg to Asuncion, Paraguay arriving at 2 am on the 5th of November. This plane was novel as the primary language spoken on board was not English but Spanish, something I had never encountered before. Luckily everything was repeated in English and the headset could also be adjusted to Spanish. Leaving the airport I was very excited and intrigued to see the city. The route from the airport to bus station was not particularly impressive though with many cars and motorbikes squashed in and a general disregard for road rules. I was very glad I was not the one driving although I was concerned about the lack of seatbelts. Using my limited Spanish I managed to buy a bus ticket to Santa Rosa and jumped on. Bus travel in Paraguay is definitely an unusual experience. For one thing the bus had air conditioning, TV, two levels, reclining seats and cost half the price as at home. The other thing was that people continually got on the bus and sold fruit, water and sunglasses. One guy even gave some sort of speech although I have no idea what it was about. I quickly fell asleep. I awoke terrified that I had missed my stop and having no way to work out if I had or not as Paraguayans don't seem to believe in road signs. After a tense hour we did arrive in Santa Rosa and I was much relieved. I waited at the terminal clutching my bags and feeling out of place among sell these dark skinned, dark haired, short, Spanish speakers who occasionally started rambling at me in rapid incomprehensible Spanish which I could only reply with 'no comprehend, yo soy Australia'. When Helen turned up to pick me up I was again much relieved. I had managed to get to Laguna Blanca without any issues. Laguna Blanca is an amazing place. Think of an ideal tropical beach. Laguna Blanca is a lot like that despite Paraguay being a land locked country. It is a large crystal clear freshwater lake with a beach of pure white sand. The house I am to be staying in for the next three months has four bedrooms, each with a bathroom, and a communal dining area. My bedroom has 7 beds but never more than 4 are occupied and at present I am the only one. Each bed is surrounded by a veil of mosquito netting which makes me feel oddly safe. There is also a fan but unfortunately it is no real substitute for an air conditioner. We aren't here for luxury and it helps you to appreciate good plumbing. After arriving in the evening I went to sleep for almost 24 hours straight and the bed never feels this comfortable again. Upon waking I am introduced to the other volunteers, interns and staff. There is Helen, Jacqui, Georgia and Jonny from England, Joe and Tom from America, Monique and Fionne from the Netherlands, Ruby from New Zealand and Dave from South Africa. Rarely before did I meet such a group of friendly and interesting people and I really hope we can all stay in contact once I go home. Primarily I was to be searching for Capuchin monkeys. At Laguna Blanca there is a troop of 9 monkeys which reside in the dense Atlantic Forest. We were hoping to habituate the monkeys so that their behaviour could be better observed and studied. The Atlantic forest is unlike any forest I have been in before. You enter the forest on a tiny little path barely more than an animal track. On either side is dense vegetation which is continually trying to grow back over the path. There are a few key plants which you quickly learn about. The most irritating is a fairly small one with little green leaves and tiny branches which looks perfectly harmless however it is covered in small thorns which gleefully attach to your clothes, making you unable to move. They are also a nightmare to cut down as the thin branches merely bounce off the machete. The next plant has huge flat green leaves about the size of dinner plates and if you touch them you will feel a sharp burning and within a minute an itchy rash. You quickly learn to avoid these and fortunately they are very easy to cut down and doing so gives you immense satisfaction. The next plant is bamboo. Bamboo is not much of a threat but grows very quickly so often needs to be cut down to prevent the path disappearing. There are than ferns which are as tall as me with huge, lush leaves, just after it rains these will leave you soaking wet. Then there are the vines, these grow from the canopy down to the ground and are somehow impervious to being cut they are also a letdown in that you cannot swing on them. Between climbing under and over and between all these plants you scour the tree line for monkeys. Unlike you they can move very fast through the forest jumping from tree to tree like acrobats. I quickly become very jealous. Generally you will hear them before you see them and I was quite surprised to find they sound a lot like a bird chirping, but staccato. Suddenly you will emerge from between trees and see them sitting in the branches and staring at you. It's hard to say who is more surprised usually. They will start moving off through the trees, usually one of the males will try to distract you off in another direction and then they are gone, leaving you staring in wonder with a few blurry shots on your camera. So far I have seen the monkeys eight times, three of them at night under a full moon. Each time is just as exciting as the first and spurs me on to further slogs through the vines and thorns. There are also a lot of other creatures in the forest. The two most concerning are spiders and wasps. For reasons known only to them both these groups like to set up their webs and nests in the middle of the path. There are also many "friendly" creatures. Giant Stick Insects pretending to be twigs, Giant butterflies flapping lazily around, their wings vibrant yellow, blue and red. Giant praying mantis sit around looking awesome deadly but rarely actually moving. Giant ants climb up and down logs. Giant, yes everything in Paraguay is at least twice as big as at home. Giant grasshoppers leap around flashing bright orange as if they are trying to be butterflies and then turning back into leaves. Giant cicadas burst from the undergrowth shrieking madly and flying into you for unknown reasons. Giant moths lie camouflaged on trees. Lizards lay basking on the ground ready to shoot off if you get too close. Birds of every colour and shape call and fly around and generally try to pretend they are monkeys giving you false hope. If you are really lucky or unlucky depending on how you look at it you might even see a snake slither across the path. When not monkey hunting i have also been helping out with some of the other projects. I have set up mist nets to catch bats with Ruby. A mist net is basically a large net strung between poles several metres apart. The bats fly into the net and get tangled up. This sounds easy however unfortunately the nets also like to get tangled up and each one must first be untangled. I let Ruby stay out overnight to actually take the bats out of the net but I was able to hold them while she photographed them in the morning. I also helped Jacqui in bird netting which is basically the same thing but with birds and thus can be done in the early morning rather than overnight. By early morning I mean we got up at 4am so we could be out there before dawn. If a bird was caught we would take them out photograph them, measure their head, wings and legs and then let them go. We got a surprising variety of wrens, wood creepers, thrushes, doves and flycatchers. Even though their beaks look sharp they can't break your skin and thus aren't too dangerous to hold except for one species which Jacqui nonchalantly informed me may try to peck my eyes out. I also have helped out with some pitfall traps. These involve a line of plastic over a group of buckets. Animals can't get through the plastic and fall into the holes. Although looking at you would think even an idiot wouldn't fall for this trap we actually caught a reasonable number of lizards, scorpions, spiders, ants, beetles, centipedes and millipedes. Of these the scorpions were the coolest and most dangerous. The final project I have helped with was Monique and Fionne's opossum trapping. They placed 245 small mammal traps throughout the Atlantic forest, transitional forest and the cerrado. A small mammal trap is basically a steel box with a lever so when an animal enters the door shuts behind it. On my trip we found two opossums. These guys are about the same size as mice but are marsupials. They are also one of the most aggressive species I have ever seen. They had their mouths wide open showing all their teeth and glaring and hissing at Fionne. We took their weight and gave them a microchip so we could recognize them if caught again. Whenever I finished field work the first thing I would do is jump in the lake. Unlike at home where the water is always freezing here it is just right and you can just sit with it coming just up to your chin and forget all the heat and sweat and insects. The lake has little fish which swim around you curiously and occasionally nip you harmlessly. The water is so clear you can see the bottom even when it is two metres deep. The whole lake is quite large and in the middle it is apparently 8 metres deep. We took out the kayaks once and paddled around it and this took a few hours. After swimming it was usually almost time for lunch. Food at Laguna Blanca varies a lot. It is usually cooked by Gricelda, one of the locals and she does a pretty good job with what's available. The meals generally include spaghetti carbonara, spaghetti with tomato sauce, rice with lentils, pumpkin soup and bread, pizza, boiled eggs with salad, meat/vegetable pie, roast chicken, empanadas, deep fried schnitzel, fruit salad, cabbage salad, cereal, roast potatoes and even chocolate cake. After lunch it's often time for another swim or just chilling, some people take a siesta, read, make use of the wifi internet to skype or even play cards. Anything to stay out of the heat which is always over 30 and sometimes up to 40. Sometimes in the evening we will get together for a volleyball game with the Paraguayans. As most of the volunteers can't speak Spanish and the Paraguayans can't speak English things can at times get confusing but it is a lot of fun. There have been several other things which have happened which I feel need mentioning. One day we found an armadillo and I even got a chance to hold it! It was immensely cute with a very tough shell and long sharp digging claws. Once we placed it on the ground it vanished within a minute. We have also had a couple of volunteers try the delicacy of fried cicada. I wouldn't recommend it myself but they said it was ok. We went for a horse ride western style on a very placid bay horse. I have seen 6 snakes which have all taken the opportunity to slither away as fast as possible however these guys are also the most lethal animals at Laguna Blanca. Occasionally we have an asado which is basically a bbq and is quite delicious although for some reason the Paraguayans don't start eating till after 10 and then keep chatting till the small hours which is not ideal when you need to be up at 4. Paraguay has regular spectacular thunderstorms and swimming in the middle of them is also a lot of fun. We made a Blair witch project styled home video which possibly only we will fully appreciate and cannot stop laughing the whole time. Overall Para La Tierra is an amazing group mainly because it is filled with amazing people. The work is often tough with very early starts, overwhelming heat and a plethora of interesting plants and animals. However it is also very rewarding when you do succeed in finding your target species and this more than makes up for it. My time here is going by incredibly quickly with only just over a month left and I am still hopeful of hitting the jackpot and seeing a jagarundi, maned wolf and of course more Capuchins. Brendan Slade - Australia Para La Tierra Volunteer 2012/13

The Butterfly Effect by Monique Brok

People say that every choice you make influences the rest of your life. That the main road you eventually walk on during your life depends on the short sidepaths you took. Everyone takes decisions in life based on what they feel and/or think. Some were good while others were bad, but even though each choice creates doubt and confuse us by thinking about what could have been, in some cases there is no doubt about it. That ''that choice'' was one of the best you made. I feel and know that for me, going to Para la Tierra was one of them. Living in a tropical fantasy world is the best way to describe staying in Laguna Blanca at Para La Tierra. Loads of sunshine that brightens up every single day, a white beach and the clear blue lake are alike those you see in travel magazines and the soft chirping of birds create peace of mind throughout the day. But there is more, much more to be amazed by. One of the first things that caught my eye since my arrival was the gathering of numberous butterflies. They were dancing in the sky, flying around in circles and eventually creating a patch, sitting side by side. I was possessed by this occurrance, it took my breath away. From this point, I felt like I was in paradise. It made me wonder what other treasures this place would hold, what other beauties lay ahead of me. Many more, I can tell you... One day, I was sitting on the porch, doing nothing significant in particular. The sound of leaves moving drew my attention. I looked up and was paralized for a moment. I saw an Armadillo, walking just in front of me in the middle of the day. These animals are nocturnal and live underneath the ground, so that it was there was a little miracle! After the severe shock passed, I called Tom and Fionne to come and with the three of us we followed it for 15 to 20 minutes. The Armadillo wasn't scared at all, it even had a look at us back from a distance of maybe 1,5 meters before it disappeared into the bushes. Some time had passed and another Armadillo, the Naked Tail Armadillo, was found at the tourist area. All interns and volunteers jumped into the back of the car and drove to the Cerrado for its release. We all got to hold the cute animal for a little bit and afterwards released it. Within seconds, the only sign of the Armadillo was a small mound of dug up sand. It was an amazing thing to withness and I cherish the memory! What intrigered me as well were the out of proportion and weird looking insects that one way or another are beauty to the eye and occur on site, such as the Longhorned beetle which can reach the size comparable to the hand of an adult person, Cicadas that look like big mutant flies with African-like paintings on their bodies and making an alarm sound during warmer nights, the Rhino beetles that have similar head figuration as real rhino's and other insects that I previously could have only imagined to exist in the real world. Walking through the forest was one of the many things I loved during my stay at Para la Tierra. To see the beautiful sunrise in the early morning, see the forest come to life with lizards running around all over the place, woodpeckers and hummingbirds flying around, hearing the calls of the insects and all creatures settling on their place. Sometimes I was lucky and saw animals that you don't so often, such as the Black Tegu. I saw two of them and couldn't believe it in the first place. If you don't know them, look them up and you will understand perfectly what I'm talking about. I just can't describe what the experience was to see them, up close, just in front of me. You have to see them and imagine them for yourself. Both times I saw them was while conducting my research. The research I was on, together with my study buddy Fionne Kiggen, was on two Opossum species; the Gracilinanus Agilis and the Marmosa Constantae. We had 225 traps in total, scattered over the 3 beautiful habitats: the Atlantic forest, the Cerrado and the Transitional forest. We went out 6 days in a row of which the first day contained opening and baiting the traps, then four days of baiting and checking the traps for the adorable little cartoonlike animals and the last day comprised checking and closing the traps. We didn't just find the Opossum species we focussed on of course! Lizards, the white eared Opossum and cute little forest rats visited the peanutbutter-vanilla melanged traps occasionally and a lot of the big bugs sped up our heart rates countless times. In my last week, I went out to the forest because I still had to do some forest structure studies for our research. So I went to the Atlantic forest and did what I had to do. A black beautiful butterfly flew up to me and sat on me for more than 1,5 hours. After it flew off again, I felt as if it given me direction to just follow my instincts and go into the forest a little deeper. I did what my gut feelings told me and went on an adventure. After walking around for a while I found a field, where I had never been before. I just walked and walked and all of a sudden, it was there. A skull of an Armadillo. I took it with me, thinking it might be something useful for Para la Tierra. It was more than that. It was a whole new species for the reserve! This was amazing! Mindblowing! I was living on a cloud and I coulnd't have wished for a more ''fairytail-like'' ending of my stay. This was more than I have wished for! This place is not just where people and animals come close together, this place is magical. It brings out the best in you, makes you wonder where you've been and what you've been doing all your life. It makes you realize there is a world that you need to see, need to taste, to feel. For me, personally, it changed my persective on life in general, on who I am, what I want to be, what I want for my time to come. I started my own little butterfly effect just by coming here. Monique Brok Para La Tierra Intern 2012-2013 The Netherlands