Updates from the Amazon

Posted by Sam Hopkins on 5th Sep 2014

We love to receive regular updates from all of our projects, and today we have been fortunate enough to receive news from one of our two South American projects - the 'Amazon Conservation Experience'. Have a read of what the staff and volunteers have been up to and what they have sighted within the last month. It really sounds exciting stuff - making us very jealous here in our London office!

"This month has seen temperatures at the Manu Learning Centre soar, reaching almost 33 degrees. Everyone has worked really hard in the heat, and were rewarded with 21cm of rain in the last week!

Importantly we've had several sightings of Blue Headed Macaws at the clay lick. As you may know, our Blue Headed Macaw monitoring project records the number of encounters of these rare birds so we can keep an eye on numbers, which means that seeing lots of them this month is extremely positive.

We welcomed an enthusiastic group of 12 hardworking volunteers this August, who have been learning and loving the rainforest experience. We were very excited to welcome our new Education Instructor Eleanor this week, who's background in conservation education and bushcraft makes her an amazing addition to the MLC family!

There has been a big push on Agroforestry this August - with volunteers working really hard to plant seedlings and banana trees that will be harvestable in 15 years time.

It's also Organic September this month. Our biogardens that we build as part of the GROW project provide fresh, organic product for families in Manu National Park to eat, buy, and sell.

There have been some great incidental sightings this month. Volunteers Hayley and Jenni came across a group of white-lipped peccary during an early morning transect. They had to cancel the survey early as they were surrounded on three sides by peccary and couldn't continue!!

This month also saw some exciting butterfly findings, with the discovery of five potentially new species to the reserve. Then last Thursday our two-week volunteer Mark had a lovely birthday surprise when he came across a Neotropical otter (Lontra longicaudis) on Lucumayu when off on a walk looking for snakes.

The other day some of our volunteers were lucky to come across Bolivian red howler monkeys and their amazing, disconcerting call! Past volunteers have described the sound of their call as a cross between a cow mooing and a boat motor...definitely a unique jungle experience!

Finally, we had an important sighting of a Cochranella nola, a very rare glass frog that's only been seen on the MLC reserve 12 times before. With the recent discovery of several new glass frog species, its good to know that the MLC is keeping up with the biodiversity!"

Wow - it all sounds like really exciting and intrepid stuff! For your chance to join this incredible one of a kind project, please don't hesitate to 'Enquire or Book Now' via our website page here. Alternatively, if you would like to know more about the project, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us via email ([email protected]) or phone (+44(0)208 885 4987). We hope to hear from you soon! Have a great weekend everyone - TGP Team.

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