The End of an Era

After over 6 years of intensive research and community development work in and around the Yachana Reserve, GVI Amazon is coming to a close. We have finished our final research project (look forward to our Road Effects paper, coming soon!) and are handing over the project to our partner, The Yachana Foundation. They will continue to maintain and monitor the reserve, using it as an hands-on science education center for students -- we're very excited to see what fabulous things this next generation of scientists find! For more detail on GVI Amazon's closure, and our accomplishments over the years, please read on...
GVI Amazon Closure Statement

Saturday, January 24, 2009

Conservation and the Community


Conservation and community work started in earnest, with a Benthic Invertebrate study. Four EMs were found hopping athletically across bubbling streams armed with nets in order to catch, catalogue and identify all manner of vibrant aquatic life to aid in the assessment of the water quality in the reserve. Other EMs threw themselves heartily into the community based TEFL programme at the local primary school. Four enjoyable hours in the week were had where EMs were taxed by bright and eager minds of a group of about ten 3-6 year olds and 20 or so 8-14 year olds! Quite a handful, but a rewarding experience all the same.

Another important part of the GVI research here in Yachana are the local bird surveys (LBS), where EMs get involved with helping with the spotting, identification and cataloguing of all species encountered in the rainforest. Everything from soaring vultures to darting flycatchers, cawing toucans and parakeets, to colourful swallows and martins, amongst others can be seen here. This week a new species has been added to our reserve list; a Fulvous-crested Tanager (Tachyphonus surinamus) was spotted, highlighting that you get to see something new every day.

Amphibian research was also kicked started with transects being marked out involving some of the earlier machete skills that EMs gained in the first week of training. Thankfully, all returned with limbs intact! Dung beetles were also on the agenda, leading to a healthy debate of whose dung might work best in luring the little critters into the traps!

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