We are pleased to announce that the partnership between the project and The ZAA has taken a big step in the realization of our common goals and visions.

For those of you not familiar with the organization, they have a simple straight on approach with their mission:

“Our Mission is to promote the responsible ownership, management, and propagation of animals in both private and public domains.”

This is the organization that invited us to speak at their November, 2009 conference in Kansas. At that conference we got a really good feel about the organization. To be honest, ours wasn’t as defined as we had hoped it would be at that point, but we knew that it had to have the support and participation of an organization like the ZAA.

THE ZAA’S STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVES:

• Establish professional standards for husbandry and animal care practices.
• Maintain accurate animal and medical records.
• Enhance the survival of species by the use of appropriate methods.
• Maintain an appropriate, safe, and quality existence for animals in captive environments.
• Establish safety measures for staff, visitors and animals to prevent injury and disease.

In addition, ZAA members are ethically bound to support and implement the Mission and Objectives of ZAA as outlined in the Mission and Objective Statements, and in general to:

• Promote the interest of wildlife conservation and biodiversity to society at large.
• Promote and encourage research and scientific method application toward the betterment of wildlife populations – their husbandry, care and conservation – both in managed environments and wild ecosystems.
• Cooperate with colleagues and the broader conservation community including private and public entities, breeders, zoological parks, game parks and ranches, sanctuaries, aquariums, museums, wildlife agencies and associated management programs, academic and field researchers and others in an effort to assist in global biodiversity in both managed and wild animal populations.
• Promote and encourage sustainability of animal populations by sound economic practices and “conservation through commerce” in order to practically and realistically help insure long-term viability of wildlife populations through sensible and comprehensive sustainable yield and renewable resource management practices.
• Fairly recognize all colleagues and stakeholders engaged in validly-based resource management and accommodate implementation of the many and various, legitimate and proven methods for sustainable yield wildlife and habitat management.
• Fairly recognize and accept responsibilities for implementation of scientifically based decisions, actions and methods in species management practices as having priority over the possibilities of emotion-based-only choices.
• Act in accordance with all local, national and international laws in all endeavors and especially as it pertains to the health and well-being of wildlife populations and conservation of natural resources.
• Conduct all affairs with a high degree of professionalism and with honesty, integrity and fairness to all concerned.

Read more Here.

Project Green Jungle, Red Frog Team, and Caribeans Coffee shop in Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica are pleased to announce a sustainable harvest and export of Cacao leaves. These leaves are meant for the zoological and private professional animal breeder. All leaves are sustainably harvested from an organic cacao farm from active trees. This is part of a yearly pruning, and is shipped in packages of 50 leaves (approximately 100g). Currently these leaves are only available for export to Germany, however we anticipate having shipments available in the US soon. Price from us direct is $5 per 50 leaves. Quantity discounts are available, and shipments can be up to 30kgs per pack (roughly 15,000 leaves).
If interested please click the contact tab on top of the page

Over 6000 miles and an entire ocean away from Barcelona Zoo where Encar Vila formerly kept gorillas and other primates, she gently sits down on a blanket covering the thick Costa Rica grass. Suddently she is mauled by 6 little black howler monkeys (Alouatta caraya). Instead of fear and worrying about getting bit and scratched, Encar starts smiling and you can see the love and affection in her eyes for the babies she has saved from pet shops, cars, mothers that rejected their young and hunters. She isn’t getting attacked, it’s break time, and break time means a bottle of milk and snacks for the wiley little bunch.
Encar is the wife of Sandro Garcia and together they run the Jaguar Rehab Center, a small mammal rehabilitation center and serpentarium. Only a few meters from the Caribbean Sea, and on the fringe of La Amistad Conservation Area (A UNESCO World-Heritage Site), Sandro and Encar have taken advantage of the natural surroundings to create a wonderful facility.
Encar says she has been coming out to this tree for the last two months with the babies, but it took around 3-4 weeks for the wild troop of 20 or so monkeys to start interacting. She has been gently easing the wild monkeys into socializing with the babies, and says at the two month mark, they pretty much have accepted the babies and even seem to be accepting her. “When I first started coming out here, they were very scared of us. Now when I come out, just me and the babies, the wild monkeys are coming down to check me out.” Encar says this as Conga, one of her oldest rehab babies climbs over her neck and face kissing, licking, and play biting her.
Reintroductions are a long and arduous process, involving up to four hours of “wild time” per day for the little monkeys.
Coming from zoo backgrounds, Encar and Sandro both understand the need to educate the public as well, and invite visitors to stop by their facility on the Caribbean Coast. It is recommended to call ahead to schedule a tour, as they try to keep the numbers of visitors down to ensure less stress on the animals, and a more intimate encounter for the visitors.
Encar is not sure how much longer it will take for the first of these babies to head off for their first night with their new troop, but she knows it will be a bittersweet day. In fact, it has already happened once. She has one female that was accepted into the troop last year.

As a project participant, you can take part in many of our activities with Jaguar Rescue Center, including:

• White paper on reintroductions of Black Howler Monkeys in the Caribbean Lowlands of Costa Rica
• Digitizing and updating of records for captive husbandry data and reintroduction information
• Zoo design grant program
• Reptile and amphibian captive husbandry research

If your interested in taking part in this project while in Costa Rica, or if you want us to help our travel professionals help you customize a trip around our project, please click here.
You can  Sign up to receive website only updates on topics like these.  If you would like to visit Jaguar Rescue Center’s website, click here.

La Marina Zoo is one the few Costa Rican facilities registered in the Latin American Zoo Liaison Program. By doing so, La Marina has committed themselves to open dialog between North American Zoos and their own organization through Project Green Jungle and the Zoological Association of America.

John Wortman of CCTU (Center for the Conservation of Tropical Ungulates), and the ZAA (Zoo Association of America), recently visited Costa Rica on a whirlwind tour of some of the country’s zoos, rehab centers, and sanctuaries as organized by Project Green Jungle. One of the final stops was an introduction of John to Juan at the La Marina Zoo site near La Fortuna in the central highlands northwest of the capitol San José. A tour of the public footpaths yielded encounters with white-tailed deer, pacas, and agoutis as they are allowed to freely roam the grounds This is one of the methods used by Jose to re-introduce some of these creatures into the wild.

The well-landscaped gardens, with their tasteful array of indigenous plants and flowers, are peppered with perches and tree branches carefully arranged for the aviary set. Open feeders encourage local wild birds to feed in front of the zoo’s visitors. Military, macaws, scarlet macaws, amazon parrots, and conures are regulars to this local eatery. Several feeding trees are arranged in the backyard of Juan Jose’s own house, where many of the birds have their own residencies inside enclosures with wide open doors. This is a sight not often seen in North America. Juan Jose says that these parrots are free to come and go as they please, and the enclosures provide protection at night.

The passion of Juan Jose’s family is shown most prominently in the careful maintenance of their facilities. Not one dirty enclosure, unfed or unwatered animal is to be found anywhere at this zoo. Also housed at this location are are spider monkeys, caimans, American crocodiles, peccaries, jaguars, margays, jaguarundies, a 21-year-old king vulture, and many others ‘just passing through.’

One particular point of pride for the La Marina Zoo is their involvement with an amazing fifteen Baird’s tapir births. This species is the largest mammal in Central America; adults weigh 530-880lbs (240-400kg). What is even more astounding is how Juan and his family have taken their breeding one step further by creating a tapir reintroduction program unlike any other. They have established “guided” tapir releases revolving around one of their early success stories, who returns periodically from the nearby park reserve lands to teach new releases how to fend for themselves in the wild. Overall, it is a really unique and astounding methodology.

Following this visit, Project Green Jungle has committed to tracking and documenting releases from La Marina as the family-operated facility does not have the manpower to handle this task. At the conclusion of this extremely productive and informative meeting with Juan Jose, a white-tailed deer was born and just taking its first shaky steps. A symbolic end to a visit that promises to be the birth of the next phase for both La Marina and Project Green Jungle.

Hitoy, meaning woolly, (referring to the mossy rocks) and Cerere meaning clear (in reference to the crystal clear water). A name that is well deserved. We have become quite adept at sliding across algae covered rocks in shin deep moving water. For those adventurers looking for a trip to a place that is literally off the beaten path, I can think of no better place than Hitoy Cerere.

To the left of the welcome sign before we crossed the bridge into the park, James saw an adult male green basilisk sunning himself. We hoped this was a good omen. Indeed it was. The trip really was amazing, and the reserve was more than we could have hoped for. Charlie met us and showed us to our rooms. James and I unpacked and walked around the facilities a bit. After getting acquainted with the relief map in the lab, we set out with cameras, snake hooks, water purifier, and grand aspirations on making it past the waterfall (The common stopping point for most that come to the reserve). Right from the beginning of the trail on the way to the river, we saw both Dendrobates pumilo, and Dendrobates auratus dart frogs. Since we came here for the reptiles and amphibians, we were already quite happy. Towards the bottom of the trail we broke through the forest into the flat riverbed. The riverbed was filled with oval shaped boulders, some as big as an SUV or bigger. A cleared trail to the left led us through sawgrass for about 100 meters. In this enclosed area we observed many Central-American whiptail lizards (Ameiva festivus). This ended up being a very prominent species around the buildings as well.

At the end of the trail we came to a clearing and then we were on our own. Immediately we noticed a semicircle of rocks with a cross pushed into the sand. There were remnants of a fire. This seemed really out of place to us, especially because I could recall specifically reading fires were not allowed. We later found out from Charlie that this fire was most likely started by indigenous that live on the fringes of the reserve. We started walking upstream bouncing from rock to rock. Up to this point, We both had kept our feet completely dry. Something the opposite of smart made us think we could go without getting our feet wet. That quickly came to an end when we had no way but to brave the shin deep water. This was our first instance of experiencing the namesake of the reserve. As we slipped and slid across the slimy rocks, the sun beat down on us, and radiated off the dry boulders. As we started to work our ways farther upstream, we began to find ourselves in more and more of a “Corridor.” The sides of the river began rising more sharply. This sheltered area gave way to a bright fluttering blue that can only be attributed to the Morpho Butterfly. The morphos were concentrated so much that I lost count of the amount of them after a few days.

As we came up on a small game trail coming down the side, we noticed a small praying mantis hanging out on one of the moss covered boulders. After we filmed and photographed the mantid, James found a 4 inch long grasshopper like insect which we have not identified yet.

Our walk back was pretty uneventful. We were getting close to sun down so we wanted to get back. As we were coming to the beginnings of the trail through the saw grass, we took out the digital and the video camera. I was walking through the trail, looking down for snakes and lizards scurrying away, when I reached up to move a branch out of my way and looked up just in time to see a very strange looking limb looking back at me. The Brown Vine Snake was as straight as the limb under him. When he saw we were interested in him, he employed one of their amazing defenses. He began swaying like a tree in a summer breeze. So that concluded day one of our time at Hitoy Cerere.

Please have a look at some of the photos we have taken at Hitoy Cerere:

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SINAC is the National System of Conservation Areas of Costa Rica. There are 11 areas represented by SINAC throughout Costa Rica. These areas are unique in their approach to conservation, trying to integrate and balance the needs of the State, Governance, Civil Society, Private Enterprise, and Country.

As of June 1995 SINAC went with a new strategy for managing the natural resources of the country, following three ideas central to the philisophical framework of the institution.

• Decentralization: Be receptive to the transfer of decision making and operational functions to areas of conservation.
• Devolution: Redistribution of human resources, technical and financial resources to the regional administrative units or conservation areas.
• Democratization: conceived as a progressive and active participation of civil society in policy-making and management of natural resources.

SINAC also recommends:

• It is recognized that it is vital to anticipate, prevent attack the causes of biodiversity loss or threats. Precautionary approach: It is recognized that it is vital to anticipate, prevent attack the causes of biodiversity loss or threats.

* Precautionary approach or indubio pro natura: Where there is danger or threat of imminent or serious harm to the elements of biodiversity and the knowledge associated with these, the absence of scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing cost effective measures of protection .
* Environmental public interest: The use of the components of biodiversity should ensure the development options of future generations, food security, ecosystem conservation, protection of human health and improving the quality of life citizens. Environmental public interest test: The use of the components of biodiversity should ensure the development options of future generations, food security, ecosystem conservation, protection of human health and improving the quality of life citizens.
* Criterion of integration: The conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity should be incorporated into the plans, programs, activities and sectoral and intersectoral strategies for the purpose to integrate the development process. Criterion of integration: The conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity should be incorporated into the plans, programs, activities and sectoral and intersectoral strategies for the purpose to integrate the development process.

• complete, easy-to-follow methods
• high-quality prepared reagents
• accurate portable, laboratory, and on-line instrumentation
• life-time technical support

Hach has donated a CEL/890 Advanced Portable Laboratory. At the heart of all CEL/800 Portable Laboratories is the popular DR/800 Series Colorimeter. Preconfigured, application- specific labs include complete reagent sets and all necessary apparatus. Many CEL laboratories include additional instrumention to expand your testing capabilities. Testing capabilities can be expanded by selecting from additional reagent sets for the appropriate DR/800 Series Colorimeter.

This Kit includes DR/890 Colorimeter, sensION1 pH/ mV/Temp Meter, sensION5 Conductivity/TDS Meter, Digital Titrator, illustrated instrument and procedures manuals, reagent sets, and all required apparatus in a rugged carrying case.

Since 1947, Hach Company has manufactured and distributed analytical instruments, test kits, and reagents for testing the quality of water and aqueous solutions, with products for lab, process, and field. Our products are designed specifically for quality, accuracy, and simplicity, and today are in use around the world.

Hach U.S. Facilities
Our Loveland, Colorado (USA) facility houses our corporate headquarters, research and development laboratories, and instrument manufacturing operations. A plastics division and the Hach Technical Training Center are also based in Loveland facilities. Over 500 of our employees work in Loveland.

Employees at our facility in Ames, Iowa (USA) manufacture and package all our chemical reagents and test kits, and fill customer orders from our main warehouse there. Advanced electronic information systems help us to pick, pack, and ship hundreds of orders throughout the world every day. About 300 Hach employees work at Ames.

Future
Strengthened by Hach’s sister companies in the environmental industry worldwide, theirr goal for the future is to continue to provide customers with reliable instrumentation, accurately prepared reagents, proven methods, simplified procedures, and outstanding technical support. Their commitment to quality and continuous improvement, as evidenced by a ISO 9001 Certification, will help Hach continue to create products that meet their customers’ changing needs.

More information on Hach, and How they are helping the people of Costa Rica will be added in the near future.
To see what this Kit can test for click HERE.

These guys work very hard to stop an ever increasing number of poachers on the island. With a value of around $20 a clutch of eggs, drug addicts are prime poachers to sell to black market dealers for their next fix. It is a sad story that can get better.

The director of the project has told us they are in need of hand-held GPS machines, revenue to pay for guards to watch over the eggs, and walky talkies.

We are currently in negotiations to find a way to provide a sponsorship through our project for them, however they are not a non profit yet. The cause is great, and the turtles need help! We will keep you posted.
In the meantime, if you are interested in sending us a used handheld GPS to bring down in June please email us Here.

Or send to:
Florida International Teaching Zoo
Project green Jungle
PO BOX 2319
Belleview, FL 34421 USA

For more info on Parismina turtles Click HERE.

Please Include all your contact info so we can give you credit towards the donation (FITZ is a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation in the US.