Sloth Sanctuary Suriname sequel: the whole story!

In our last report we mentioned that we are making the finishing touches to our facility. And this is indeed truly happening as you can see from the pictures in our 5^thSloth Wellness Picture Report. The animal kitchen is funded by Welttierschutzgesellschaft with whom we signed a second partnership agreement that next to animal welfare will also focus on more information and awareness-raising, a training in the medicine of sloths, a sloth action plan, as well as a wildlife welfare workshop. So, that means it is going to be a busy year for us next to our rescues and releases. The intensive care unit and the animal treatment room were also completed as shown in above report with the financial support of Kosmos Energy and you, our GlobalGiving donors. Outstanding on the intensive care unit is the air-conditioning to ensure that the temperature inside this unit remains stable. The human kitchen was fully funded by our GlobalGiving donors. We sometimes do tend to forget that the humans providing care for our animals need to be taken care of as well.

We are now working on finishing the educational part of our center. The graphics and lay-outs are being prepared. Our star volunteer Wynne prepared everything in word and idea, now it’s the job of the graphic designer to bring it to life. Kosmos Energy provided funding for the educational part of our center and this will be brought into place in the coming month. We are now searching for a part-time educator who will receive visitors who have made an appointment. It is sometimes hard to explain to our visitors that we do not keep animals in cages and that there is no guarantee that if they visit they will see something. Ana and 19November remain around the center and show themselves erratically, and the same is true of Beertje. Although he does seem to enjoy getting his apples, pumpkin and rice from time to time.

Our three juveniles are not on show, so we do not allow visitors to come in that part of the center where they are. However, especially Jinkoe is now showing some independence and can regularly be seen in the trees next to the center. Ostrich is not as adventurous yet, although she is a month older. When I say she, I have to confess that as long as she is not one year old, we do not know for sure if Ostrich is a female. The same is true for Jinkoe. Avi is growing well, that is our two-fingered sloth baby who we allow to venture out of the incubator in the evening. Often that leads to trips into the jungle gym where the animal suddenly tends to feel insecure and it then starts screaming for its mother. When the red teddybear is held in front of Avi, she climbs so fast onto it, that you would not believe it is really a slo(w)th.

Our next big project is setting up a good storage facility, where we can keep our kennels, stocks and other utensils that cannot be stored in the main building. We hope this can be done with some financial aid from our donors in the coming months. As always, we thank you for your generous support for our sloth rescue center.

This Valentine’s Day the sloths send you love from their now almost finished home in Suriname. In the past months we have been working hard on making the finishing touches to the separate rooms, and your donations have given us the financial support to actually do this. One corporate donor has taken on the outfitting of the intensive care unit and the related emergency care room, as well as the educational component of our center. Which brings me to the work of our star volunteer for this year, Wynne Minkes, who is back to finish her work on the educational part of our facility. Minkes received the Sloth Award 2017 this past Monday.

Education at the Sloth Wellness Center

Apart from a sanctuary for sloths, anteaters and armadillos (the Superorder of the Xenarthra), the Sloth Wellness Centre is also intended as an educational center. Here, GHFS will teach (school)children and adults from Suriname and abroad about these extraordinary South American animals and the dangers of deforestation. This type of education is much needed, as the average Surinamer still associates the forest with a scary and undesirable place to be in, and wildlife is mostly seen as a source of meat or even vermin that needs to be exterminated!

With beautiful photo's and interesting facts, we want to create sympathy and awe for the Xenarthra. Thus, we hope to create a future generation of Surinamers with more appreciation for its lush forest and its inhabitants. Few realize how unique Suriname is in the world, as it is still covered with 93% of pristine Amazon jungle! There will also be some activating 'sloth' games for children and adults alike.

The space on the ground floor between the two shipping containers is designated as the education space. One part of the information will be about the sloths, anteaters and armadillos occurring in Suriname (2 sloth species, 3 anteater species and 5 armadillo species). And all other information will be on GHFS' care taking of these animals, on the harmful effects of deforestation, and on actions that visitors can take themselves. We hope to show the results of our work in our next report!

First rescues of 2018

Where we left off in 2018 in our last report with Igor, the giant anteater, we started our year with the rescue and release of the tiniest anteater that lives in Suriname. The silky anteater. This animal that is often mistaken for a baby is with its 260 g an adult and an amazing nocturnal canopy dweller. Unfortunately, we only receive these animals from deforestations, because otherwise they do not come to the forest floor. As these animals are extremely sensitive, this adult silky anteater was released in the forest sanctuary behind the Sloth Wellness Center on the day we received it. For many years it was assumed that there was only one single species occurring throughout the whole of South America, but Flavia Miranda, our anteater friend from Brazil, established in a paper published at the end of last year that there are in fact 7 different species.

We thank you for your continued support and are looking forward to maybe seeing you at our center in the future.