I was born in Lima Peru.  As it will become obvious in future posts, I was attracted to birds since I was very young.  Among ornithologists and birding friends, the question always pops up as ‘how did you get hooked on birds?’  Well, with me, the first recollection I have about birds is being sick in bed with a bad cold. My older brother brought a baby Crocking Ground-dove to cheer me up.  Now, I figured he must have known I liked birds, and that was  why he brought that flightless baby bird he found on the ground on our backyard.  He put the bird in shoe box lined with a kitchen mantle and presented it to me.  I was maybe 5 or 6 years old and had no clue how to take care of a baby bird.  I thought, ‘well birds live among plants and flowers, therefore they must feed on them’.  I would sneak out of my room and go to the back yard to pick up leaves and flowers, and put them in front of the dove.  I watched the dove for hours on end for two days, hoping to see it eat the leaves and flowers– without any luck.  After two days of observation, the leaves and flowers from the previous day wilted and curled without any evidence of being touched.  I noticed the bird became more and more impatient and kept trying to step out of the box; now I knew the poor creature was so desperately hungry.  Back in my room, I thought the baby bird was missing its mom and was probably (or most likely) trying to see her.  After thinking I should put it back where it was found, I did so on the third day after it was brought to me. I then thought the baby dove was reunited with its mom and lived happily ever after.  It was not until after many years of observing birds and taking ornithology classes that I learned that in some species of birds, chicks leave the nest soon after they hatch and are assisted by the parents as they grow to become adults.  In other species, chicks stay in the nest, and are taken care of by the parents until they are able to fly and feed on their own.  I also learned that chicks that are supposed to stay in the nest until they are able to fly are not helped by the parents once they fall off the nest.  Croaking Ground-doves belong to the latter category…..

From then on, everything I did was somehow related to nature and birds.  I went on to study forestry and wildlife management as an undergraduate student.  Every summer I would take jobs in the high Andes, the cloud forest of the east slope of the Andes or the Amazon rainforest of Southeastern Peru.

After finishing college, I received a scholarship to go the prestigious Manonmet Bird Observatory, now known as Manomet Center for Conservation and Sciences.  The then Manomet Bird Observatory offered two scholarships for two young Latin American ornithologists every year, I had received one of them. As part of the training program, I was able to travel to Puerto Rico to do ornithological work with migratory shorebirds. After Manomet, I contacted Dr. John Fitzpatrick, the current head of Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology.  He had been conducting ornithological work in Southeast Peru, at the sites I spent some of my summers.  We had a lot to talk about; Dr. Fitzpatrick was then the head of Archbold Biological Station in Lake Placid, Florida, and offered me an internship there after my stay at Manomet Massachussetts. As I write, I recall the great memories I have about life as an intern naturalist at Archbold Biological Station.  What I learned and experienced at Archbold station was phenomenal! From Archbold Station I applied for admission to the Master’s Program of wildlife ecology and conservation at the University of Florida. It was after the completion of my master’s degree that I met Dr. Richard Bodmer, who had been working in the Amazon of Peru and Brazil for many years.  Richard and Pablo Puertas, had been conducting long term studies of Amazonian mammals, and had become authorities in various fields related to the Amazon Rainforest.  They first studied various aspects of the natural history of large Amazonian mammals and primates, and then became interested in the impact of hunting on the populations of the very species they studied.  I too became interested in learning the effect of hunting on the large Amazonian birds, such as curassows, guan, chachalacas, tinamous, trumpeters and other bird species commonly used as source of protein in the Peruvian Amazon. That’s how Richard Pablo and I began to work in the Amazon.

I wanted to learn everything about Amazonian game birds, how native Amazonians perceive and use them, and what the effect of hunting pressure was.  The reason for all of this was that Richard, Pablo and Tula Fang who was also working with primates in the Peruvian Amazon, noticed that, in regions where deforestation was not a significant problem as in the Peruvian Amazon , wildlife was disappearing.  Overhunting for commercial uses and subsistence hunting were the likely causes. So with the help of Richard, Pablo, and Tula, and armed with a detailed plan to collect information, I headed to the Amazon. This time, to the real Amazon right along the world’s largest river as supposed to the Amazon basin in southeast Peru where I had been working before. I had picked two study sites: one located in floodplain forest along the Maraňon River, adjacent to the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve, and the other in highland forest adjacent to the Tamshiyacu-Tahuayo National Reserve, which coincidentally was created thanks to the years of work and advocacy by Richard, Pablo and Tula among others.  Richard owned a small vessel, “La Nutria” which we would use to criss-cross the Peruvian Amazon and its tributaries in search of knowledge and adventure.

The small vessel "La Nutria" was used to explore the far reaches of Amazon and its tributaries.

When I was about to start my fieldwork in the region, all I had to do was introduce myself to the villages’ authorities and the communities where Richard Pablo and Tula had already been working.  I needed to find a host family willing to let me stay for up to two months at a time.

Living in a household at a native Amazonian village was one of my life’s greatest experiences.  I could write a book about it, but for now I will write about my work there.  I became a household member rather than a guest at the households I stayed.  As such, I did all things members of  that household do on their daily lives, such as helping gather and cut firewood, planting yucca and banana trees, weeding the fields, make fire for the stove, cut up ingredients for a meal, rock the youngest baby to sleep, and just about everything household members were expected to do.  They would crack up when I was doing all those things; they thought it was funny.  But the most important activity for me was accompanying the head of household and often the oldest boy on hunting trips that lasted either most of one day near the village, or up to a week further out into the forest.

Amazonian villagers living near cities no longer use the bow and arrow or blow guns that their ancestors once used.  The portrays of native Amazonians with outfits made out of palm trees and  topless women depicts the way it was many, many years ago; and still is but only in remote regions in the Amazon basin. Contemporary Amazonians no longer use such traditional outfits.  Native Amazonians use shotguns and acquire ammunition from the big cities in the region.

Witnessing all aspects of the daily life at my host family was very important in understanding the interactions between people of the Amazon and the rainforest they live in.  One of the first realizations was that hunting was not the most important activity at the majority of household in the village. Fishing and agriculture are the most important subsistence activities.  Hunting, for most head of households in the village was more of an opportunistic activity. They carried a shotgun on gathering and fishing trips in case the opportunity of shooting a peccary, a monkey, an agouti or a large bird presented itself.  Only a handful of community members were dedicated hunters who do this as the most important activity.  The household I stayed in was in the middle regarding its affinity for hunting wildlife. The head of household and the older son hunted near the village on trips lasting a few hours, and also went on trips that lasted a week or so.  The week-long trips were multipurpose, and often times the main focus was fishing.

My adoptive household on the west bank of the Maranon River.

As we covered long distances walking on barely visible forest trails with the hunters at my host family, I observed how they detected the animals, prepared an ambush if necessary, or tracked down the animals.  Also observed what animals were the most preferred, and how the animals reacted to the hunters.  The monkey hunts often required long pursues, but were often unsuccessful.  When the chase got hectic, all I could do was catch up with at least one hunter as they chased an animal.  Chasing a troop of monkeys required leaving the trail we walked on and running in all directions. I recall saying to myself, ‘I hope they know their way back’, because I had no idea how to get back to the trail, or less, get back to the village.  I literally felt in the middle of nowhere. I also recall how I wished the curassows escaped the hunters when one was spotted and chased. Shooting an adult curassow is just not worth it; but I would not express what I thought, since I was supposed to be an integral part of the hunting crew.

I spent time at multiple household at my study sites in floodplain forest and high or also knows as terra firme forest.  I joined Richard and Pablo on various expeditions to many small tributaries of the Amazon, often to vary remote areas or the Amazon where uncontacted tribes of native Amazonians still exist and fiercely protect their territories.  Folks in these region still use bow, arrows, and blow guns for hunting animals, and wear the same outfit they did when they were born. I have been coming back to the Amazon River since my trip in 1995.  There are a lot of stories, and I will tell them in subsequent posts.  Some posts will be stories and anecdotes; others will be dedicated to the birds, wildlife, plants in the rainforest, and the people that live in it. As the Amazon Rainforest is becoming an increasingly popular travel destination, the purpose of this blog is to answer questions, clarify popular believes, and shed light on various aspects of this magnificent yet often misunderstood region.

By: Alfredo Begazo