2019/04 Panama trip - Gamboa Wildlife Center |
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For the afternoon the two of us were going to the Gamboa Wildlife Center, close to the hotel we’d walked to on the Wednesday. We drove through a strange subdivision that used to be for US civilians working on the canal. Now it’s owned by the hotel; the houses are large and well maintained but they look to be mainly empty with the windows wide open.
Igua left us in the hands of the Center’s staff and promised someone would pick us up later. Rain was coming and going but it was warm rain. We were on a tour with about ten others, a mix of English and Spanish speakers.
There was a sloth in a tree outside the Center but I couldn’t see it. There were plenty inside within the rescue centre, either injured or orphans. The injured can usually be returned to the wild, but orphans can’t survive their stressful life in the wild without a mother’s training and may have to be in captivity for the rest of their lives, maybe 30 years.
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Gamboa wildlife refuge (4.54) |
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There are three kinds of sloth in Panama, two-toed and three-toed, and a very rare pygmy version of the latter. They all have three toes on their back feet. The obvious differences are in their front feet, but there are many other differences including facial and skeletal. (See the comparison picture: three on left, two on right.) The two species are only distantly related, a case of convergent evolution. In both cases, they can hang by their claws for hours without any muscular effort.
The Center only had two-toes on show as the three-toes can’t take the stress of human visitors. This two-toe was definitely unstressed, lying on its back and munching hibiscus flowers.
This stick insect launched itself up my camera strap onto my arm. I donated it to a little boy sitting on his Dad’s shoulders and 
he set it loose on his Dad’s head. They are creepy but harmless.
We moved on to the butterfly garden and got closer views of the butterflies we’d been seeing all week. The stars were the giant blue morphos, but they weren’t any easier to photograph in the garden. The instant they stopped flying their wings would snap together showing only their brown undersides.
The final stop for us was the orchid garden. We were told that Panama has over 14000 species of orchids so the garden’s hundreds of varieties were just a sample. Sandie enjoyed this.
The bird perched on the orchid is a yellow-throated euphonia.
Tatiana, the Tower’s manager, arrived to collect us. We were just about worn out so we said we were ready to go, but we 
had forgotten about the frog garden. We missed the frogs.
Back at the tower, a three-toed sloth was fully exposed in a cecropia tree that had not yet leafed out, an odd choice as there were nearby evergreens to hide in. However we appreciated the entertainment while we drank our Balboa beer.