Back to work in the Pantanal

26/07/2016 in Conservation

(Photo by Lindsay McCrae)

I’m delighted to say we have finally been able to get back to work in the Pantanal! Due to the extensive flooding, we had been unable to access the Baia das Pedras ranch since February; however, since my last update we have run two expeditions in the Pantanal and two expeditions in the Cerrado.

When we first returned to the ranch it was easy to tell that the flooding had been particularly high this year. Thankfully Rita and Carlos, the owners of the Baia das Pedras ranch, had a tractor from another ranch waiting for us to get across a particularly bad stretch. It is important to remember that these extreme floods are part of the natural ecology of the Pantanal and, in a way, help to maintain the pristine environment as they discourage development.

(Photo by Fergus Gill)

It is not always easy to keep this in mind when the flood waters make our work so challenging! On this trip I was especially worried that we would be unable to cross the floodplain to reach our study area. Thankfully, although the water was very high and we could only cross in one particular place, we were still able to navigate the floodplain.

One of the main objectives this expedition was to re-capture Eric, a young male we found back in December who we believe to be around four, or maybe even five, years old. We were eager to learn if he was sexually mature or not - an important question that we had not been able to answer with Alex. It may sound trivial, but this is actually a key piece of data in allowing us to understand more about population growth rate. Eric´s procedure went smoothly and a GPS tag was attached to him. The great news is that Eric is still not a mature male and by following him closely over the next few years we hopefully will be able to discover at what age this will happen.

The May expedition was a bit different from our usual field trips as we were accompanied by a film crew. Maramedia (the makers of the recent Hebrides and Highlands series for the BBC) have been commissioned by BBC Natural World and WNET to film our work in the Pantanal. We were delighted to host Justin Purefoy, Lindsay McCrae and Fergus Gill and have them work with us, as well as film the abundant Pantanal wildlife. We are extremely grateful to Maramedia team for providing the beautiful images for this update. 

(Photo by Lindsay McCrae)

Another piece of great news is that upon our return to Campo Grande in early June, Gabriel, Bruna and myself gave a talk about giant armadillos and presented all the education materials we have to 250 science teachers. It took us almost a year to organise this workshop with the Municipal Secretary of Education (Secretaria Municipal de Educação). We must now wait and see if and how these materials will be used. We hope it is another significant step in our efforts to raise awareness for this incredible species.

With so many expeditions in a relatively short period of time, there is much more to update you on. I look forward to sharing our tales of catching up with some of the other armadillos and giant anteaters in my next update.

Until next time… all the best from Brazil!

Arnaud