Hello reader, welcome to The Ara Project’s shiny new blog! My name is Angharad and I’m the site manager at our Punta Islita breeding and release centre. Along with some special guests I’m going to be writing this blog to keep you up to date on our conservation work and share stories of living and working in Costa Rica and with some very special birds!
So for starters, what is a teacher from Western Australia doing managing a conservation centre in Costa Rica?! Well, because I love parrots! I began falling in love with birds when I was a teenager and kept Rainbow lorikeets and Eclectus parrots as pets. I’d always been an animal lover of course, and as a child dreamed of being a vet and working with big cats in Africa (when I wasn’t imagining being a famous actress – all dreams of grandeur anyway!)
A year and a half ago my sister and I left Australia to backpack through Latin America. I had already seen The Ara Project on Facebook through The World Parrot Trust so thought I’d apply to be a volunteer. While here in April 2015, between scrubbing aviaries and chopping fruit and veg, I met Sam Williams, the then very new director of The Ara Project and he offered me the incredible opportunity to return here as the site manager of the Punta Islita breeding and release centre. What an incredible opportunity!
So I returned here in early October and it’s been a whirlwind so far as we work to improve conditions onsite for our birds and humans and overhaul many aspects of our organisation as we look at ways to be more effective and efficient at helping save these two species. My role covers a huge variety of tasks; there’s a never a dull moment as I manage volunteers from all over the world, run and develop our tours for the public, look after 105 captive birds kept for breeding (along with some help from visiting vets and biologists!), monitor our released flock of Scarlet Macaws and learn Spanish as I work with Fabio our Costa Rican staff member. I’ve never worked so hard in my life or felt so satisfied with the changes I’ve helped instigate.
Life here is often challenging and frustrating; we are a not-for-profit organisation so our resources are limited and most of us are still learning and adjusting daily to living and working in a country with a different culture and a different language as well as a climate that has two extremes. But I only have to look up to remind myself of why I’m here and what I’m doing. We are surrounded by rolling hills covered in dry tropical jungle that end in dramatic cliffs plunging into the sea. In the wet season when you stand in the ocean (the beach is a 10 minute walk away) the cliffs march off into the misty distance. Right now, in the summer, its not so different from my Western Australian home – dry and dusty but beautiful too. We live alongside monkeys, snakes, coatis, spiders, an outrageous diversity of birds… sometimes the aviary corridors are full of dancing butterflies.
And then, most importantly of all, there are the macaws, or lapas, to give them their Costa Rican name. They are the most important and best bit; like us they’re intelligent (well, some of us…), talkative, affectionate, social and long-lived. They’re noisy, messy and argumentative. For me, the similarities between us and them are endless; they’re social learners and spend their lives teaching each other, they raise their young together, they’re more or less monogamous, they’re emotionally intelligent and I have no doubt they can grieve and have a sense of humour. With over 500 different sounds, it’s clear they have their own language. There’s so much personality and so much colour. When you see our released flock fly in over the hills in the evening, it’s all worth it.
I’m 5 months in now and still loving working with these incredible birds, things are improving daily thanks to an amazing, dedicated team, inspired volunteers, a driven director and lots of hard work – let’s see what the next few months bring!
By Angharad Thomas
Photos by Sophie Hill