Otto (19) is taking a gap year before he heads off to university to study Environmental Science. He spent a month learning Spanish from scratch in Madrid and then with a host family near Asunción in Paraguay. This was important preparation for his 2 month volunteering placement at the Para La Tierra Foundation, the only year-round scientific research station in Paraguay.
Photo: Otto with other volunteers and local biologist with a huge native tree; Fundación PLT
Otto's report gives fascinating insights into the important work that the foundation does and shows just how much he learned during his time there: "The city of Pilar, where the Para La Tierra Foundation is based is pretty wealthy for Paraguay. There is lots to do such as play padel or head to the beach by the river for stunning sunsets. When I first arrived things, started off quiet and slow, but I was sent to work collecting black and golden howler monkey behavioural data, either close to the house on foot or cycling further away on the house bikes. I was also sent out with an intern whose project was collecting data on frogs using pitfall traps. After the first couple of weeks, I became an expert from doing these every day. As time went by, more people started arriving: the volunteer coordinator, new interns and volunteers and there were events such as national holidays or carnivals.
Photo: a very happy Paraguayan frog; Otto G.
The volunteer house provided food, fruit in the morning, lunch and dinner throughout the day with access to the kitchen on Sundays. I slept in a huge bunk room which I had all to myself for the first month, and I really appreciated the fan in there every night to deal with the immense heat. Once the volunteer coordinator arrived and things became more structured: there were planned of activities each week such as the tuco-tuco tag and capture project. The tuco-tuco is an endangered species of burrowing rodent with very little known about them. They were difficult to catch using traps and I only managed to see two which had already been chipped before. We started on other projects such as bird points and insect transects which increased my knowledge of different species; it was all very interesting. On Thursdays, the data that I collected would be entered onto the database as well as pinning any insects we collected during our transects.
Photo: Otto investigating with a local staff member; Fundación PLT
I was also lucky enough to experience a trip to the Gran Chaco with some new volunteers who were very keen Americans. This was great trip: we stayed in the middle of nowhere going on expeditions and hikes and seeing an abundance of scary, dangerous and fascinating wildlife. For my final week, we had an important government project which involved monitoring fish populations after construction of buildings along the river. This was highly standardised scientific work and we had to be thorough without getting too wet."
Everyone at the Foundation and The Language Gap is incredibly proud of Otto for taking part in this amazing experience and for stepping out of his comfort zone to learn a new language and travel across the globe to immerse himself in another culture. If you would like to join this project or hear about our other partnerships with conservation and environmental education programmes around the world, just get in touch by clicking the button below.
Photo: Otto pinning vital insect samples for the biodiversity project; Fundación PLT