Going to Belize was one of the best decisions I could have made. This was an amazing experience and I would recommend it to anyone with an interest in animal science or environmental science. When I arrived in Belize, I was picked up from the airport by the program provider and taken to the Tropical Education Center (TEC) near the Belize Zoo. The workers at the TEC provided us with amazing meals for breakfast and dinner each day. Around the TEC, we went hiking and went birding and enjoyed movie nights after long days. The first day, our program coordinator arranged for us to go cave tubing and zip lining through the jungle. It was a great introduction to the country. The next night we went on a night tour of the zoo and got acquainted with the staff we would be working with over the following weeks.
One of the most interesting, ongoing projects at the zoo is their Problem Jaguar Program. Because of the destruction of their habitats, jaguars have been hunting livestock and pets, rather than their natural prey, such as peccaries and white-tailed deer. Prior to the start of this program, livestock owners would just shoot the jaguars. Now, they will call the zoo to come retrieve the animals before they do anything drastic. All the animals at the Belize zoo are native, rescued animals. There are currently twelve problem jaguars residing at the zoo.
Another place that we visited was the Community Baboon Sanctuary. This sanctuary is made up of seven local villages that have agreed to protect their land and not destroy any of the forest to preserve it for the howler monkeys in the area. We were able to hike through the jungle, following a group of howler monkeys with our binoculars. One of the members of this group was an infant howler monkey that was about 6 months old. Our instructor pointed out how the young monkey followed the exact path through the trees as its mother. If there was a place that the gap between the branches was too large for the monkey to jump, the mother would hold onto both branches to make herself into a bridge for the monkey.
One of the learning activities we did was making homemade blow-darts. Blow-darts are a big part of wildlife research as well as at the zoo. The staff at the zoo has learned to make do with what they have as they are limited on funds as well as resources. Manufactured blow-darts can get very expensive, so in a pinch, they will make their own. We were able to make our own blow-darts, as well as practice shooting them.
Another learning activity we did was making enrichment for the zoo animals which helps prevent stereotypic behaviors such as pacing or scratching. Enrichment keeps the animals entertained. We were able to make our own forms of enrichment for specific zoo animals and execute those ideas to see how effective they were. I chose the mountain lion in the zoo and made him a swinging toy that was filled with lemon grass and chunks of meat. There is an odd form of enrichment that the zoo staff often uses for a jaguar that was born and raised at the zoo. Zoo-goers can pay to be inside a cage inside the young jaguar’s enclosure while he does jumps, summersaults, and licks foreheads! My group was able to take part in this enrichment, and it was an exhilarating experience being licked by a jaguar!
A big part of this program included a lot of hiking. The majority of this hiking was done at Runaway Creek, a protected piece of land in Belize. We hiked to many different places on the reserve to set camera traps to hopefully see some animals (when we checked them at the end of the program, we had caught a jaguar, some deer, and a tapir on camera). We hiked up a mountain into some caves that the mountain lions and jaguars often sleep in. They use the caves as a shortcut through the mountain rather than going all the way over it. The first cave that we hiked to was the first cave in Belize in which Mayan cave drawings were found. While setting camera traps, we also set up various mist nets at different areas in the jungle. We opened these nets days later very early in the morning to catch some birds and band them. We caught a total of six birds and placed ankle bands on them so that we could track them if they were ever caught again.
In addition to the Belize zoo, the Raptor Center was one of the places we visited. The Raptor Center is a rehabilitation center for raptors that are found in Belize. The locals see these raptors as threatening and often shoot them or destroy their nests. The Raptor Center takes care of these birds and attempts to eventually release them back into the wild. I got the chance to hold one of the falcons at the center after pushing through my fear of birds!
Probably one of my favorite things we did in this program was necropsies on exotic animals. Among these animals was a snake, a toucan, two parakeets, and a raptor. My partner and I performed the necropsy on the toucan and concluded that it died of liver disease due to the off color of its liver and internal fat. This was later confirmed by my professor.
I really enjoyed this program and intend to return for one of the other programs that CELA Belize offers. After this trip, I am much more interested in exotics and wildlife veterinary medicine as well as environmental science.
