Peruvian Amazon - Madre de Dios
Report to the National Birds of Prey Trust (cont'd) 25 August
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The first capture, caught on August 3rd. This is a female BuMa01 caught in an abandoned gold mine site (abandoned six years and still looks like a desert). I intend to return to attempt to catch her mate. |
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MiSe01 Juvenile male – this male was caught twice, once here at the research station at a trap we put next to our chicken cage – this may be the “guilty party” who was trying to break in to our cages! The second capture was roughly a kilometer away, in a completely different habitat: closed forest (more normal), and about 6 days after the original capture. |
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BuMa02 adult (older) male captured near the port here below the research station (where the boat drop off supplies for us). This guy had an old injury which looked to me like a gunshot wound, maybe just because I have seen so many, but it healed well. He is old, but healthy and he and his mate have already begun defending their nest site. We have captured the female twice, but she has escaped both times within seconds! |
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What a beautiful bird! This particular morning was cloudy, and I did not take my good camera out into the field with me (wouldn’t you know?). This is the M. Gilvicolis , male, I think, only 207 grams, I am waiting to hear from someone who knows more about them if this may be a male or female. |
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This is an example of how we prepare the jugular vein for our blood collection. The feathers are not plucked, they are wetted with isopropyl alcohol and moved aside, and the vein is right there in the area without feathers. This makes blood collection safe and rather easy, I have found that I greatly prefer this to collecting from the wing! |
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| This really shows what a tiny guy he is (and how happy I am to have him)! He was quite a surprise! |
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BuMa 03 and 04 are a pair that were captured within an hour of each other at a place called Casa de Mineros (Miner’s House). It is an abandoned goldmine site next to an aguajal (a monotypic palm swamp) and it is full of macaw nest cavities. We hitched a ride there on a boat with the macaw team from World Wildlife Fund. They had mentioned seeing many birds of prey there. The female (pictured on the right) was first; she came to a juvenile chicken, and the male (left) a rat about 45 minutes later. They are beginning their nest construction in the goldmine site. |
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Picture report continued.... |
