Volunteering in the Amazon - with the giant river otters

As the plane broke through the clouds on its descent to the airport, a breathtaking view of rainforest, unbroken apart from a chocolate brown river snaking lazily through it, was revealed. The Amazon was a place I had long dreamed to see. I had come to volunteer at an eco-lodge along the Tambopata River.

As we floated down the murky river into the rainforest the humidity enveloped me like a blanket, and rain started to fall. I saw a makeshift wooden raft covered in blue tarpaulin tied up at the river bank. It was an illegal gold mining outfit; in the process of finding gold the miners pump mercury into the rivers, poisoning the fish and local wildlife. It was a depressing introduction to just one of the many threats the rainforest is facing.

Join a Photography workshop in the Amazon www.FotoForever.org is a not-for-profit course that runs alongside its sister conservation organisation, Fauna Forever, to provide photography workshops in Peru, and a once in a lifetime opportunity to capture the wildlife (and people) of the Amazon Rainforest under the guidance and support of renowned wildlife photographer Elliot Neep, his assistant Jonathan Lewis, and a professional team of rainforest research and conservation experts. The workshops, held at ecotourist lodges and research centres in the Tambopata National Reserve (the most biologically diverse rainforest region on Earth), are open to people of all levels of experience, from novices to more advanced photographers, and offer participants the chance to broaden and strengthen their photography skills, work alongside experienced researchers and conservationists, and create a portfolio of potentially award-winning images. Click here for more details.

The rainforest is a hostile environment for a newcomer: fire ants are aptly named, a family of tiny mites ate their way up my legs and I was a mosquito's best friend. The constant humidity rotted everything unbelievably fast; mould grew on my bags within the first week. Giant trees competing for sunlight left the forest floor in constant twilight. Animals were surprisingly hard to spot; the dense tangle of vegetation meant that I could have been a few metres from a jaguar without seeing it.
 

Despite these challenges the rainforest has much to offer. For five weeks at the lodge I worked monitoring giant river otters on an oxbow lake deep in the forest. With fewer than 5,000 remaining, these otters are listed as an endangered species. Populations initially decimated by fur hunting are now declining due to habitat loss and the effects of gold mining.

In the lake there was a family of seven otters. We would canoe out and record their behaviour, numbers and photograph their neck patches which, just like fingerprints in humans, are unique and can be used to identify individuals. The information is used by the lodge and monitoring agencies to verify population trends and determine which conservation efforts are best suited to protect the species.

The highlight of my trip was being treated to a magical view of the family playing together and basking in the sunlight, paying no attention to the strangers watching from a canoe. White-winged swallows darted around, hoatzins clumsily balanced on branches, and a kingfisher plunged into the water and returned to its perch with a fish.

It was astounding to think that this perfect place had remained in harmony for so long without human intervention, and troubling to think how this delicate balance, intricately woven over thousands of years, could be so easily unravelled.

As I left the jungle and took the canoe back towards the local town we passed another gold miner, but this time I felt a glimmer of hope that although damage is being caused to the Amazon, at least there are people who are doing their best to protect this invaluable place.