Peru Project – Day 1

Young Explorers Blog – Day 1

Our day started with a bus ride to Universidad Científica del Sur (Andrea’s university) where we picked up our project poster. Next, we visited the University farm, where we saw and learned how to catch llamas and alpacas; once you manage to get close to an animal, you have to grab it under its tail and neck simultaneously (avoiding its spitting). After visiting a few more animals, we met with Fanny Fernandez, from the Corosha Project, who taught us all about the environmental, ecological and social context of Peruvian jungles. This informative talk equipped us with the right knowledge for our subsequent interview at Radio Capital were we talked about illegal animal trade with the famous Peruvian broadcaster Carlos Carlín. Finally, we were ready to head home to celebrate Andrea´s birthday a day in advance.

How to catch a llama:

Since the University Campus has a farm next to its campus, we thought it we could be a good idea to go and have a look. We saw some llamas and Andrea showed us how to catch them. There is only one-way to catch a llama: You first have to manage to get close to it. Once you’re about one step away, you have to jump, putting one hand around its neck and the other one right under its tail. After a couple times we Andrea managed to get it right. The llama did not seem to be very happy to be “hung-up” in such a position. Luckily we were only surrounded by females, which are known to spit less frequently than the males. We only had a moment to take pictures until the llamas started to show the first “spitting” signs, so we quickly released them.