Manuel Antonio National Park
Our last day of this ten day trip: For some, it feels like a trip of eighty days around the world. Not because it feels that long but because of the countless wonders we have seen venturing through the tropical forests of Costa Rica and Panama.
Let me tell you that our last day didn’t disappoint. Today we went to visit what some people consider to be one of the crown jewels of the national park system of Costa Rica, Manuel Antonio National Park. We had a great morning. Great looks at white-throated capuchin monkeys, two-toed sloths, raccoons, Central American agoutis, white-nosed coatis and at least thirteen three-toed sloths. One hot spot had six of them within 20 steps along the trail, two of them resting on the same tree.
No doubt that this place is going to be in our minds for many years to come. There is one reason that this place is so magical in its abundance of medium sized animals: It has become the smallest national park in this country and it is surrounded by towns, crop land, and pasture land. Manuel Antonio is an island of forest with no connection to any other forest nearby. This island is too small to keep populations of large mammals, especially large alpha predators such as jaguars and pumas. These animals are no longer part of the ecosystem and no longer in control of the population of the medium sized mammals such as monkeys and sloths. They are experiencing a demographic explosion, and that’s why we had these great looks of them. But that creates a set of problems for these animals that have been trapped in this man-made island. They face problems of inbreeding and competition for the scarce resources of the park.
So even though this is a national park, we don’t really know if it is a safe place for the animals. Their future may depend on our ability to create biological corridors to link this place with other forests so animals can move in a bigger and healthier habitat.
Our last day of this ten day trip: For some, it feels like a trip of eighty days around the world. Not because it feels that long but because of the countless wonders we have seen venturing through the tropical forests of Costa Rica and Panama.
Let me tell you that our last day didn’t disappoint. Today we went to visit what some people consider to be one of the crown jewels of the national park system of Costa Rica, Manuel Antonio National Park. We had a great morning. Great looks at white-throated capuchin monkeys, two-toed sloths, raccoons, Central American agoutis, white-nosed coatis and at least thirteen three-toed sloths. One hot spot had six of them within 20 steps along the trail, two of them resting on the same tree.
No doubt that this place is going to be in our minds for many years to come. There is one reason that this place is so magical in its abundance of medium sized animals: It has become the smallest national park in this country and it is surrounded by towns, crop land, and pasture land. Manuel Antonio is an island of forest with no connection to any other forest nearby. This island is too small to keep populations of large mammals, especially large alpha predators such as jaguars and pumas. These animals are no longer part of the ecosystem and no longer in control of the population of the medium sized mammals such as monkeys and sloths. They are experiencing a demographic explosion, and that’s why we had these great looks of them. But that creates a set of problems for these animals that have been trapped in this man-made island. They face problems of inbreeding and competition for the scarce resources of the park.
So even though this is a national park, we don’t really know if it is a safe place for the animals. Their future may depend on our ability to create biological corridors to link this place with other forests so animals can move in a bigger and healthier habitat.
