A couple of years ago someone shared with me about a volunteer
project with wild macaws in the Amazon. I was immediately intrigued.
The Tambopata Research Center website said we would be
counting exotic birds, monitoring macaw nests and perhaps even tree
climbing. It sounded great but to imagine being in the jungle, so close to wild birds was the most exciting part to me.
I applied to the project and got in. The first
document they sent for me to read was called Health and Safety in the Jungle
-What to Be Concerned With. The insects, spiders, and snakes mentioned did
not scare me. It said we might encounter a jaguar – but I wanted to see that! It
detailed tropical diseases such as malaria or yellow fever and this concerned
me some but leishmaniasis really scared me! It was an illness contracted from a
type of sand flea that created open sores on the body that would be hard to
cure. I definitely did not want to get that!
But I had to decide if I would go or not.
Finally, I agreed. I would be sorry if I missed the
opportunity I had always been asking for- to live in the jungle among the
animals. Besides, it was cheaper than paying rent anywhere in the US and I was
already nomadic and without a home. So I made plans to go to the Peruvian
Amazon for two months.
From the moment I arrived, I was in awe. Every plant and
creature fascinated me. I could not stop asking questions. I wanted to absorb
everything, to not miss a thing. Brilliantly colored scarlet macaws, green and
red macaws and blue and yellow macaws were everywhere. They were magnificent. Macaws were always flying overhead, calling
to each other in ultra-loud screeching sounds that could be almost deafening. At
least ten different other parrot species also lived there on the Tambopata
river, attracted to a clay lick that they got a lot of nutrients from. There
were even birds I knew from Georgia and Florida- roseate spoonbills, snowy
egrets, and hawks. The Oropendola of the Amazon was one of my favorite birds.
It was colorful and made a beautiful song that I really believe inspired Jim
Henson’s alien puppets, sounding a bit like it was underwater. There were jakimar,
toucans, nun birds, and buzzards among many many others.
I saw many large snakes (never knowing which were actually dangerous) and even a spectacular electric blue tarantula one early morning. And of course, I got to see many varieties of monkeys-spider monkeys, capuchin, titi monkeys, squirrel monkeys, and howlers. I saw a family of capybaras (worlds largest rodent) and even the rare blonde anteater (almost blind) and the large river otters (only 200 left in the wild, eight in this region) made an appearance for me.
As soon as I arrived I was immediately taught to climb
trees. It was baby macaw season and a lot of help was needed. I was so excited
to learn tree climbing that I wore myself out. I was exhausted within my first
two days and had to take a day of rest.
I continued to learn to climb and within a week I was
climbing the one rope system, sixty to one hundred feet off of the ground, in ceiba
trees four hundred years old or more. Though I really wanted to climb, I was also
terrified, wondering what the hell had I gotten myself into. After about my
fourth tree climb, I finally trusted my equipment and it began to feel
natural.
But climbing was not the most challenging part of my
duties.
Once I was up in the tree I had to take the macaw
chicks out of the nest, put them in a bucket on a rope and lower them down to
the veterinarians on the ground for monitoring. Sometimes one handheld me in
place and one hand got the chick into the bucket. Sometimes I even had to use a
hand to hold the mother macaw under a towel and try not to get a finger bitten
off while I retrieved the chick. I was always concerned about dropping the
chick from such a height. I had to be very focused to ensure the safety of us
both.
While tree climbing I also remembered that I have
exercise-induced asthma. I would get halfway up the rope and then have to stop
to catch my breath and breathe, normally again. I was not afraid of an actual
asthma attack because I knew when to stop and breathe but I did not tell anyone
else for fear they would think I was incapable of climbing and might try to
stop me.
I wanted to be in the trees as often as possible, in
close contact with the macaws and other wildlife that lived there. I loved it
when I was in a tree and a troupe of monkeys would cross right in front of me,
jumping from tree to tree- some with babies clinging to their backs. I felt
like I was one of them, sharing the forest canopy as natural as can be.
Sometimes I would be walking a trail and come across a
group of peccaries (a type of wild boar). If they had babies they could be
really fierce and their big sharp tusks made me know I did not want to have a
run-in with one of them. I was always sure to find a fallen tree nearby that I could
jump onto if they charged. They cannot get off of the ground more than a couple
of feet thankfully. You always knew when a peccary herd was close because they
smelled so much like a sewer that you could not escape it from even hundreds of yards away.
If they passed my room in the night the smell would wake me from my sleep.
Our other volunteer duties included research such as counting
and bird census, looking for nest fights and observing the birds foraging
habits. It was all a ton of work and hours of hiking daily. My muscles were constantly
aching. I had had no training to prepare before I got to the Amazon but my excitement
always kept me going. We wore rubber boots everywhere because the trails were
so muddy and we sometimes walked through water up to our waists, home to caiman
(a type of alligator) and anacondas. I
got blisters on my feet and they hurt all of the time.
The bugs were horrific, constantly biting us. There
were at least three different kinds of mosquitos and six different biting flies
(one which carried the leishmaniasis, but you never knew which one it was if
you got bitten).
But just knowing that every day I might see something
spectacular made it all worth it.
I pushed myself harder physically than I ever had. But
even with all of the health concerns and all of the hard work on the body, it
was better than any adventure I had imagined. And even after hundreds of bug
bites, I never got a tropical disease. I was forty-four years old and I climbed
forty-four trees in sixty days.
I was living my dream to be close to animals and
experience the Amazon. I was getting the deeper connection with nature that I
had been asking for.
And before I left the Amazon I was blessed with one
more dream come true. To see a big cat in nature. The ocelot is one of the
rarest sightings of a big cat in the wild. Yet for a couple of minutes, at less
than fifteen feet away, I looked one right in the eyes. I was never scared- I
just knew that I was being blessed by mother nature and how truly magical it
was.
