ENVIRONMENT-ARGENTINA: Wildlife Tracked Via Satellite

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Dec 23 1999 (IPS) - Five ‘yaguareté’ (jaguars) – the largest South American feline, which inhabit Argentina’s northwest – are to be fitted with 3,000-dollar collars by people fighting for the big cats’ survival.

The costly collars are not made of diamonds or precious metals, but are leather strips holding a transmitter that sends satellite signals used to track each movement of the prized animals. They also carry a battery lasting nearly two years.

The project is an initiative of the Argentinean office of the Greenpeace environmental group, the National University of Jujuy (the northwestern province bordering Bolivia), and a non- governmental organisation (NGO) dedicated exclusively to studying these jaguars, the Yaguareté Association.

Their goal is not only to prevent the depredation of these felines, which are hunted by landowners because they kill cattle for food.

“The idea is to save the jungle, which is the habitat the jaguars and so many other animals need,” Greenpeace’s Emiliano Ezcurra told IPS.

The jaguars, known for their round spots, are considered the largest felines of South America. A large yaguareté can measure two metres from the head to the tip of the tail.

Earlier this century, they could be found throughout the region, but now only two jaguar families survive in Argentina, one in the mountain jungles of Yungas and the other in Misiones province, in the northeast, bordering Bolivia and Paraguay.

The most numerous group, of some 200 animals, is found in a strip of the Yungas jungle, which has the second greatest biodiversity in Argentina, after the Misionera Jungle.

Yungas – meaning “abundance” in the local native language – borders southern Bolivia and four other northeastern Argentina provinces, and contains a nature corridor 80 km wide and 200 km long.

Greenpeace had already carried out an intensive campaign there to prevent a pipeline crossing the region from entering the nature area, where 350 indigenous Kolla families also live, farming the land amid their centuries-old cemeteries.

The environmental group believes the mega-project, in addition to indiscriminate logging and the search for oil, have led to the destruction of 90 percent of the jungle territory in the last few decades.

In addition to the South American jaguar, the region is home to species of toucans, monkeys, ocelots and pumas. The variety of birds in the area is so great that 60 percent of the species flying over Argentinean territory are found there. A great diversity of insect species is found in the area also.

The tracking project – which will cost 50,000 dollars, financed by Greenpeace Argentina members – began its practical phase this month with the arrival of experts in the nature corridor, where they will select sites for setting traps to catch the jaguars.

The traps are cages that will hold bait – a piece of beef – but not at first.

The cages will be placed so that they become part of the jungle environment. Then, in January, the biologists will open the doors to the baited cages, and await the jaguars.

By February, they hope to have five of the big cats moving through the jungle fitted with the transmitter collars.

With the satellite, and using a transmitted sound that projects on a map, the trackers will know when the animal moves, when it is eating or sleeping, when it approaches its prey, or when it reproduces.

The experts see the jaguar as an “umbrella” species because preserving it means protecting other animals that make up the food chain: monkeys, ‘corzuelas’ (small crows), mountain turkeys, tapirs and pumas, among others.

“When the jaguars enter the cages, we will give them a sedative so that they sleep for 45 minutes,” explained Ezcurra, “and in that time we will put on the collars, take blood samples, paw prints, as well as their measurements and photos.”

Finally, the five “chosen” animals will recover their freedom, unaware of the fact that, for two years, they will be tracked via satellite.