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In August 2006 I had to visit Colombia for work. Unfortunately I had precisely 4 days to arrange the trip and so couldn't do justice to Colombia's mammal watching potential. But I saw enough to know that I had to return soon, which I did - again for work - in October 2006, April 2007 and April 2008. Colombia - or at least the Colombia I saw - is about as close to paradise as I can imagine. It is ridiculously diverse with about 406 species of mammals. I think only Brazil has more, but Brazil is about three times the size. The biodiversity is driven by the geographic diversity: Colombia has serious mountains, grassland plains, rainforest, desert and coastal forest. I can't imagine anyone ever has an excuse to be bored. Add to this some of the friendliest, happiest people I've ever met, a low cost of living, delicious food and you begin to get the picture. And I haven't even mentioned the women. The country has, of course, a reputation for being dangerous. Things have improved a lot in recent years but there seems little doubt that large swathes of the remoter areas are pretty risky, especially at night. But the 'safe' bits of Colombia seemed very safe. There was a particularly strong military presence visible that weekend because the President was being sworn in for a second term in office.
For my first visit, I had less than 3 free days to go chasing mammals and had decided to head out from Bogota to 'Los Llanos' (the plains) - an ecosystem that occupies a good portion of the centre and north of the country and comprises a mix of grassland, swamp and forest that drains into the Orinoco. It was fairly close, and apparently safe. I stumbled upon a tour company called De Una Colombia. They spoke good English and Thomas Doyer there, a Dutchman, tried hard to help me organise something, despite the 3 days notice. He came though and was able to arrange for Pocho (real name Carlos Alfonso Avellaneda), a friend of his, to be my guide and driver. Carlos already had plans for the weekend so he wanted to bring his girlfriend Jessica along. And Carlos speaks about as much English as I speak Spanish (14 words), so he also bought along Juan, a mate of his who spoke excellent English. They were good company and the next 3 days felt more like a road trip with my mates than an organised tour. Carlos is a licensed tour operator and knows a lot about Colombia and its fauna. He and Jessica have recently begun producing a Colombian magazine called Retorno that was a sort of National Geographic kind of a thing and very nice. They were well clued up about the wildlife and were willing to go without sleep until I found it. I travelled with them again twice on subsequent visits. Los Llanos Although there was apparently a reasonable amount of wildlife around, the mammal watching was frustrating. I'd wanted to go out by boat to spotlight that evening, but none of the locals could be persuaded to take me: they were nervous about being shot at by terroristas. Perhaps not unreasonable. It also sounded like spotlighting from the road could be a bit dodgy so we only travelled a kilometre or so outside town, during which time we saw several Caimans but no mammals. We'd arranged for a boat to take us out at 6 the next morning (apparently there was no problem with traveling in the daylight). The boat didn't show up, though the owner was sure it would so we wasted an hour waiting. By 8am we had found another guy who could take us out and headed down river for about 25 miles (doing 30 knots into driving rain which wasn't the best) before striking out into the more wildlife rich habitat of narrow creeks and oxbow lakes.
We were in search of Capybara. Though the area seemed quite undisturbed the animals were decidedly skittish and I guess there was a good deal of hunting pressure. We found heaps of fresh shit around the grassy marshy edges of creeks, and heard splashes and hippo-like gruntings of the animals themselves. But I couldn't see one. On the way back we stopped to see Pink River Dolphins (Botos). I had thought these would be easy to see - just a matter of stopping for a few minutes at the confluence of the Meta and another river, about 5 miles downstream from Puerto Gaitan, and so I hadn't factored in much time for the stop. When we got there, the skipper said the Dolphins are only common in the dry season. August isn't the dry season. We banged the side of the boat to attract them without success. We then circled around the confluence of the rivers. At one point we hit a patch of real murky water (apparently favoured by the Dolphins because it is often rich in fish) and I heard an animal surface and blow behind the boat. Carlos saw it. I didn't. We spent another half an hour hanging around in case it resurfaced. It didn't. We had to leave. The pain of it. Back in Puerto Gaitan we visited the local wildlife carer's house. Well worth it because we could get up close and personal with Pacas and Capybaras, a Peccary, a baby Tapir and a Giant Anteater, to name but a few. All the animals had been found locally and were being rehabilitated. The Anteater was most entertaining, doing this crazy defensive dance thing whenever we got near: it would balance on three legs, slope to one side and raise its front foot in the air and ineffectually claw in our general direction. The animal may have been drinking because about 10 seconds after it lifted its foot it would invariably begin spinning donuts and then fall down flat. I can identify with this behaviour.
The 4 hour bumpy drive back to Puerto Lopez was uneventful until I stuck a spotlight out of the window about 30kms out of Puerto Lopez. Within 10kms we saw a Giant Anteater foraging in a paddock near to a farmhouse. Great views for about 10 minutes. It was much bigger than the little bloke we'd seen at the wildlife carer's place and this was the species I wanted to see more than any other in South America. Too cool.
Several people had told me that I'd be unlikely to find many mammals in the Puerto Lopez area. But there was some decent looking gallery forest along the river and I felt sure there would be some monkeys around at least. Early the next morning we asked a few of the locals and were given directions to a spot along the river about 10km east, back towards Puerto Gaitan. Just past the monument that marks Colombia's geographic centre is a turn off to the left (when heading out of Puerto Lopez) that heads towards the river and some farms. Ricardo's Finca was, so the school kids said, the place to see monkeys. Ricardo was very welcoming and let us wander through his forest. Within minutes we heard several groups of Red Howler Monkeys roaring from less than a kilometre away. About 15 minutes later, in the middle of the forest and near the homestead, I saw a Red Howler and baby moving through the canopy, closely followed by a Squirrel Monkey. A few minutes later we found a group of White-Fronted Capuchins and then a Southern Amazon Red Squirrel. Four species (all new for me) in 20 minutes. If I had time in Bogota again I'd like to check this place out at night. If the security was better I'd be tempted to head deeper into Los Llanos to go looking for things like Tapirs, cats, otters and armadillos. A park called Macarena, on the border between Los Llanos and the Amazon sounds a fabulous place for seeing wildlife, but the area is still reputed to be lawless and unsafe. Parque Chicaque The park is a little higher than Bogota, up at around 2,200m, and it is near the waterfalls pictured below on the Bogota River. It is a couple of kms steep walk down to the Park lodge, which has a glorious view over the valley, and campsite. There are a heap of birds there but apparently not many mammals. Though the park's website notes that Spectacled Bear was recorded there in the 1990s, and Sloths and other nice things have been seen there too, it seems that there isn't a great chance of seeing much other than Squirrels during the day. I saw a small Andean Squirrel (Sciurus pucheranii), my mate Carlos also saw what was probably a Neotropical Red Squirrel. My spotlight was buggered and so was I, so I didn't go spotlighting that night. The steep walk back to the car, with the unused spotlight battery and 15 unused small mammal traps was particularly painful.
Leticia Cartagena Santa Sofia
Access to the caves was pretty easy - it was a slippery climb up the hill side, but then it was straightforward to get into the cave itself. There were many bats inside and there may have been more than one species. But the only species I managed to catch and identfy was a Geoffroy's Hairy-legged Bat (Anoura geoffroyi) aka Geoffroy's Tailless Bat.
Pocho can take you there. Parque Tayrona Parqye Tayrona is a national park near the town of Santa Marta in Colombia's north. Its popular with Colombians and foreign backpackers for its beaches and though most of the guide books mention the wildlife in the surrounding forest, most also said that the mammals remain deep in the forest and are seldom seen. There are several places to stay and I spent a night at Arrecifes, which was made up of a campground, restaurant and a handful of cabanas. Arrecifes is a 3km walk through the forest from the park HQ. I was only there for 24 hours and focused my mammal watching on the trail from the HQ to Arrecifes. During the day it was busy with a procession of people on foot and horseback. But I had the trail to myself during a dawn walk. There are several species of monkey in the park, the best of which are the endemic Cotton-top Tamarins. A small group was active about 500km along the trail from Arrecifes at 6am, and there were more late that afternoon even closer to the campsite.
Around the camp ground and in the forest, pairs of Red-tailed Squirrels were very common and vocal. I also saw several Central American Agoutis along the trail.
With more time I was told that the 2.5 hour walk from Arrecifes to the community of Pueblito was good for monkeys. White-fronted Capuchins and Red Howlers were quite common, especially near Pueblito itself.
As I was driving out of the park after dark I saw a Crab-eating Fox at the side of the road near the main HQ.
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