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Published: November 9th 2006
Our experiences of the park are quite different as we worked with separate animals, so heres mine first. See ya Pete
Our idea of the park was that it was still being set up and that we would be based in the jungle building cages and helping out with animals where possible. On arrival the park was up and running though a little short on volunteers. Due to a lack of male volunteers at the park I was teamed up with Liu a Tiwanese man to work with Yaguaru a 120 kilo 4yr old male jaguar who didnt like women.
After my first day I discovered that he didnt like Liu much either.
As Liu was trying to change yaguarus line on his overhead cable so he could swim in the river, Yaguaru decided he wanted to play with Liu a little. Now when he is playing you usually end up pinned on the floor and trying to calm him down by talking to him. All this is happening while you are trying to get your arms or legs out of his mouth. All a bit much for my first day I didnt have a clue what to do, do
My mate Liu
Liu told me it was normal for this to happen, GREAT!!I try to help and get a mauling too or stay still. I opted to stay still and get a photos of the whole thing for Liu. OOPs was that the cowardly thing to do.
A little history of Yaguaru, he was rescued from a families home where he was kept as a pet, at 8 months old he started to get a bit big and kept going for the women in the house. The options for him were go to a Bolivian zoo and live in a small cage with no interaction or stimulation, go to the park where he gets a 30x30m cage in the jungle where he can swim in the river and run on lines and maybe be walked. Also at the park he is fed well and has a vet to look after him. The only other option for Yaguaru was to be come a Rug!! Luckilly his owners saw sense and donated him to the park.
As time went by with Yaguaru he chilled out a little he would lick the sweat from my arms(even this drew blood with his rough tongue) and let himself be stroked.
Every day though was an adrenalin
Monkey Business
Faustino and Coco doing what howler monkeys do filled adventure, where something would scare the crap out of me. One afternoon 2 girls who wanted to take photos and I went to feed him. We let him out on his runner and within 5 minutes he had shot 20ft up a tree to get a monkey. This is all well and good untill he tries to get down and hangs himself from his line.(In all the time he has been there he has never shot up a tree, Cheers Mate) He was swinging madly from his neck claws flailing every where I managed to release the main cable as he bounced off the floor he shot straight back up the tree again, Great! Suddenly he was on the floor, the slight problem that Jackie quickly pointed out was that his collar was still up the tree. Shit free Jaguar. I quickly told the others to get into the cage and we locked ourselves in. How weird was that us now being the caged animals. Yaguaru paced around outside while we all swore alot at this shitty situation, no one could help us, if they tried he would get them first. Luckily for us we had meat so I
came up with the plan to put the girls in a saftey exit at the back, while I scattered meat around and then climbed the 20ft barbed wire fence in my oversized wellies to release the door. On opening the door Yaguaru sprinted in and destroyed the meat container while rolling aboult a lot. It was an awsome sight. We were all safe and the cat was alive, a good days work I think. That night beer sure tasted better and the air smelt sweeter.
That was how it was at the park for me, maulings most days and adrenalin like you wouldnt believe. It was great.
Hello there,
Hope life´s well with you all.
Like Pete said we weren´t too sure what we aere letting ourselves in for when we headed to Ambru Ari, we certainly wanted a jungle experience but didn´t think we were going to get quite so close to the animals.
When we first arrived all the vols and staff were working out in the park so we were greated by the three resident howler monkies, Faustino, Coco and Junior who liked nothing more than to lie on your lap having a nice
tummy tickle.
All the animals here have either been rescued from domestic situations or are here on contract from Santa Cruz zoo. Although the aim of the park is to release the animals back into the wild this is not possible for most animals as they are too used to human contact and would more than likely end up in bits in La Paz at the witches market. The few larger animals (ocelots and pumas) that could be released have no where to go. The only option would be to airlift them further into the remoter parts of the rainforest' but financially this is not an option. However there are numerous animals that have been released and come and go as they please including a couple of coatis (fat mimi and daughter), a couple of small mountain cats and of course the monkeys.
For the first few days i looked after Bolita, a beautiful baby anteater. WE spent quite alot of time slowly mooching through the park and looking for ants. I felt quite smug not having to fear for my life every day, i just got drooled on quite a bit.
Bolita had been rescued from a local
market. Her mother had been killed as her nose on a necklace would have apparently brought someone good luck?! She needed feeding and walking a couple of times a day and wanted lots of hugs inbetween.
As new volunteers arrived i was moved to look after a Puma named Yuma. I was told from the start that she really didn´t like girls and had been given to the park as she was also attacking the female members of the family- Great! So i was to feed, clean and try to get her on a runner until another male volunteer arrived.
I managed to get Yuma on her runner by carefully sliding my hand in her cage but mostly she hissed, growled and tried to scratch me. Once she was on her runner i had to be extremely careful' every time i turned my back she was stalking or charging me, claws out. Luckily Adam arrived and took over Yuma duty.
Yuma´s cage was really small and i had my doubts while working with Yuma if the quality of her life was greatly improved. It wasn´t until i got to spend time with Naoemi and Inti, Wara, Yassi ( three Puma
Fred
Yes Caroline had a pet Tarantular!! sisters) that i realised how good the cats lives could be here at the park. If only they had the opportunity of working with a volunteer on some kind of long term basis.
Naoemi ( a long term bolivian volunteer) had worked with the cats for 2 years, since they were 6 months old and had become their surrogate mother (their real mother having been killed by poachers). Don´t get me wrong they were still big cats and occasionally tried to bite and scratch because they were feeling nervous or playful but Naoemi taught us that if we had confidence, patience and respect in and for the cats they would reciprocate.
The next ten days of my time at the park were awesome as i got to know the three sisters each of whom had very different personalities. Wara liked to protect, Yassi was a little nervous but loved to purr along when you sang to her, and Inti was the hunter and liked to hang out in the jungle and take everything in (this often meant when everyone else had gone for lunch you´d be sat in the jungle just chilling with her until she was ready to go home). We walked through the jungle and went swimming in the river most days.
I could babble on and on about how great being here was and we have bored the pants off some folk we have met. But if you ever find yourselves in Bolivia definately make time to go. What they need here in the park are long term volunteers preferably anything over a month as this ,apparently, is the minmum time to be able to build a relationship and trust with most of the other cats.
We only had two weeks and by the end the mosquitoes (who seem to particulaly love me) and the ticks and range of other bitey things started sending me a little loopy.
If you want to get in contact with the park, go there or donate money take a look or email the folowing
ambueari@latinmail.com or ambuaari@yahoo.es
Check out Parque Ambue Ari at www.blogger.com for other volunteer experiences and pics
Cant find web address right now but if you google Parque Machia and intiwarayassi youll probably get there eventually.
Take a look the following for more of our pics. http://www.jeber.com/Members/dragonfly/
Off to jesuit missions and Brasil from here..........
Bessos y Abrazos
Caroline xxx
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Jamie
non-member comment
Animals and Pete don't mix
It has to be said that Peter has a history of animal incidents and I feel that someone should have warned Caroline before their venture. There was the crazed hippo incident at Nakuru, the massed monkey attack at Samburu, the angry puff adder at Namutoni, the tent staining colubus crapper at Navashia, the wasp swarms of Etosha, the stampeding cows of Gcico and who could forget the divvi gerbil of Halali. All of these incidents had one common denominator - Pete. Put him somewhere nice and sheltered and walk away quickly. Have a great one guys, we're just off up to play on Napes Needle.