Animal rehabilitation – how it should be done!

“I will not leave money, property or fame for my children when I´m gone. I will leave them something much more valuable than that – a forest full of animals that they and other people can enjoy.” — Orlando Zagazeta

I found a center for animal rehabilitation that does exactly what it says on the box! It´s all about releasing animals back into their natural environment, no tourist business, no money from volunteers, no cages to keep animals in for tourists. Just animals, being freed to where they belong – the jungle.

Orlando Zagazeta is the main person behind a small, low scale center, that has released over 300 animals into the jungle around Tarapoto in it´s 3 years. And in his life, he has released over 3000 animals into freedom.

No other metric is better than that for a rescue center. And nothing is more important for Orlando, than animals and their rescue and rehabilitation. He doesn´t eat until they get fed, he gives all his fruits and most of his vegetables to them and himself eats biscuits and coffee…

Hi lives FOR the animals, not FROM the animals, and is a true inspiration to me. More about him and the center in these videos and reports from a couple of years ago:

Julian Pampa – Living with wild beasts

Tamushal – Orlando Zagazeta y protección de animales silvestres

Interview for Peru.com – Tarzan Peruano

Premio Integracion – more about Orlando Zagazeta

His work is now being supported by a bunch of people willing to help, under association called Cerelias.  It´s all work in progress, early days, so the website needs a re-vamp (which I´m working on – it will be www.cereliasperu.com or check out Cerelias on Facebook), the center needs a new site, to give the animals better facilities. They are looking for publicity and for support from the government, local companies and people, to be able to build better facilities for the animals, accomodate more animals, build an area for animals that can´t be released for reasons like removed canine teeth when they were pets, so they can´t protect themselves etc.

I was there for 4 weeks, initially planned 1 or 2 weeks, but after seeing how good the center was, the animals in the process of rehabilitation and the beautiful setting in the middle of the jungle, I couldn´t resist to stay longer.

So how did it go, what did I do? Well, I´ll let some pictures speak:

This is the center, it´s falling apart a bit, the monkeys have destroyed the roof, that´s why resources are needed for a new place, with a strong roof that the monkeys wont take apart!

I was spending a lot of time with the animals, feeding them, cleaning their areas, taking them for walks, repairing the facilities and sometimes, picking their fleas or having them pick stuff off of me 🙂

But after work, there was time to relax with the animals too:

And there was plenty of silly time too!