From one of the smaller subregions of O Rio Dourado to the largest area, we're heading into the next part of our Amazonian region.
Welcome to Area 4: the Dense Forest
Picking off right where we left off, we're at the edge of the boardwalk of the Sekrepatu marsh. To our left we have a small cliff (I feel like we've had a lot of cliffs recently...) with a small waterfall flowing off it. As you may have noticed, this waterfall flows from one body of water into... the same body of water? That would be correct. This smaller river flows down the cliff on this side, and very slowly on the other side, creating an island in the middle.
As we look down into the water, quite a few fish species can be seen. The biggest of these fish, and the one to catch our eye first, is the large Smooth-back river stingray. The colour makes it blend in well with the sand on the bottom of the river, but the movement and the reticulated pattern on the back gives it away. Along with multiple small cichlids and tetras, we can also see a medium-sized catfish resting on the riverbed. With black and yellow stripes, this species is sometimes called the Giant bumblebee catfish. If it didn't happen to be sitting on a dark-coloured rock slab, we wouldn't have been able to see it.
As we cross the bridge onto the island we quickly notice the change in scenery. The island is generally more trimmed, and there's multiple ropes and climbing structures made out of branches. Immediately to our right there's a low glass barrier, behind it is a rather lush exhibit with a sandy open spot in the middle. This enclosure is home to a pair or Nine-banded armadillos, a species who's numbers have recently been increasing in Europe.
Armadillo enclosure:
We follow the path further onto the island. One of the ropes going above the visitor's path suddenly starts moving as a few of the islands residents walk right over our heads. Three in a row with their tails high up in the air, these are Coppery titis! One of three species allowed to walk among the guests on this island.
On one of the feeder platforms designated for the monkeys, we can see a little thief taking some of their food. A Collared trogon, a bird as beautiful as it is unique, keeps picking small berries out of the food bowl before flying off somewhere into the jungle. A good sign, since flying back and forth like this probably means he's taking care of chicks. Now, if only he would use the bird feeders instead...
The path continues past the small cliff before looping around and going alongside a small water stream, this shallow mini-creek offers the smaller tetras refuge from some of the predatory fish inside the larger section of the river. We can actually see a few Jewel tetras, with beautiful red colouration, swimming between the partially submerged plants. Also visible on an underwater log is a small pleco with soft yellow colours and black stripes, this is the Candy striped plecostomus.
Look of the mini-creek:
Also visible in this creek is another greenhouse-wide free-roamer. A sunbittern is on full display with it's wings out, showing the beautiful sun-shaped spots that are usually hidden under his own feathers. Sunbitterns only do this when they are threatened, so let's take a step back to give it some space.
On the other side of the path we come across another viewing point into the Armadillo habitat. Unfortunately for us, the animals are probably sleeping somewhere in an underground burrow. What isn't sleeping, though, is the second monkey species that calls this island home. Raiding the mealworms in the Armadillo's food bowl is a pair of Cotton-top tamarins. This critically endangered monkey species originates in the Caribbean lowland forests of Colombia, where most of its habitat has unfortunately been destroyed. This island holds a total of 7 Cotton-top tamarins, and we can see a few more in the trees inside the Armadillo exhibit.
As we continue on our path we can see a few strange objects on the floor. Small, black-and-white striped sticks? They seem almost artificial. Too thick and flimsy to be needles, but too smooth and plasticky to be sticks of any kind... If we continue walking and look up into the trees we might actually be able to find the culprit: sleeping between two branches of a medium-sized Guiana chestnut tree is a black-and-white ball of spikes, a Brazilian porcupine! Two Brazilian porcupines free-roam the island along with their monkey housemates (islandmates?). Despite being mostly nocturnal, they're apparently comfortable enough to sleep relatively close to the path.
Now that we've seen all three free-roaming species of this island, we can continue off the island and onto the wooden bridge/boardwalk that spans this very broad section of the river. On the other side of this bridge we can see a gorgeous scene: this still-standing section of the river is filled with huge Amazonian giant water-lilies. On top of one of them we can even see a Wattled jacana. Known as the Kepanki in Suriname, this family is famous for their unsettlingly long toes, which they use to walk through shallow water. Or in this case, through the puddle in a giant waterlily.
From this platform we can look into one of the deepest sections of the river. Immediately catching our eye is a large, slender fish at the water's surface. This is a large Black arowana, which swims around slowly before suddenly biting the air, creating a small splash. Thanks to this we can actually see a few more fishes as they get startled. Although they weren't quite invisible, they were difficult to see before a few of them turned sideways to change direction. A rather large group of piranha-like fish swim in the deeper section of the water, these large, disc-like fish are Spotted metynnis. With spots on their sides and a red chin these animals are really quite striking.
From this platform we also get a view of the side of the monkey islands. There's a large, marshy section with separate islands connected by ropes for the monkeys to walk over. In the water between these small islands there's all sorts of semi-aquatic plants, including a lot of Water hyacinths. This marsh area once again provides shelter for the smaller fish. Also between the plants we can see another Twist-neck turtle. This specimen is actually one of the free-roaming turtles, which can enter various aquatic areas of O Rio Dourado as they please.
View from the boardwalk near the monkey island:
The "official" route takes us off the boardwalk and deeper into the forest, but we're here to take every possible route. So we walk the other way instead and back onto the path between the viewing points of the Sekrepatu marsh. From here, we can enter an adventure path. With some rocks in the way and dense vegetation on both sides, this path is meant more for kids and adventurous types.
The path is quite steep as we walk uphill into one of the densest sections of the O Rio Dourado greenhouse. Some tree roots and rocks provide a rudimentary staircase on our route up the hill. As we trudge through the jungle we can actually see a lot of activity from small birds. High-pitched calls and strange jumps allow us to identify this small, dark blue bird as the Blue-backed grassquit. The males of which love jumping into the air as a dance for any females around.
Also watching the strange display is a group of small, red birds. These are Red siskins, an endangered finch species from Northern South America. O Rio Dourado has quite a large group of these beautiful little birds, as well as a behind the scenes breeding group.
As we encounter a split in the pathway we take the right path. You know, for plot convenience.
The path continues through the dense plants before suddenly switching to a boardwalk suspended above a large enclosure with much less planting. I'd love to give a detailed description, but unfortunately that's going to have to wait. We encounter this enclosure again later in the route, where we'll have a much better view. What I
can describe for you, though, is the free-roaming animal currently sharing the bridge with us.
Easily one of the most recogniseable monkeys of South America, there's a family of White-faced sakis sitting on the railing. A male with pitch black fur and that recogniseable broad, white face, and two females with dull grey fur. As we approach, though, they quickly jump off the railing and into a tree inside the exhibit below us. They continue to stare at us watchfully as we continue over the bridge that quickly leads back into the jungle.
The adventure path twists and turns as it slowly heads downward. With an extreme amount of luck (and a fair bit of suspension of disbelief) we see another Poison frog in the bushes. Most poison dart frog have bright colouration, but the Ecuador poison frog is particularly unique. Instead of having stripes or spots, the Ecuador poison frog has hundreds of tiny, red bumps on its otherwise black skin. Since the free-roamer pictures won't be released until the greenhouse finale, I highly suggest looking up the
Ameerega bilinguis for yourself
.
As the path heads down towards the water we get to one of my favourite parts of O Rio Dourado. In between the Amazonian giant lily pads, there are large stepping-stone-like platforms in the water. But instead of stepping stones, there are large, wooden Lily pads.
(The lily pad path (lily path? no, that doesn't work) in O Rio Dourado would be longer than this one, and slightly further apart)
The stepping pads are slightly wobbly. Don't worry folks, that's on purpose. They can't actually flip over, of course.
This Lily pad lake is the deepest area of the small river, and we can look down into the water to see a few more fish species. Unfortunately, due to the lily pads, the water is actually quite dark. From the shape, though, we can tell that there's two large pike cichlids swimming near the bottom. Much closer to the surface there's a large group of interesting-looking fish. Very small and very slender, these fish are much more recogniseable from the side. These are hatchetfish, another surface dweller. Whereas the Arowana prefers open water, hatchetfish stick to swimming in between dense plant cover. The giant lily pads provide protection from the predatory monster fish that we saw earlier.
The most interesting thing visible from the stepping pads, though. Is a large underwater viewing window... inside the water? About a meter tall above the lily pad lake, there's a large, rounded glass wall that provides viewing into a taller body of water. Inside we can see various large fish species, among which a school of Silver prochilodus and a large Tiger sorubim. Over the glass wall we can also see right over the water's surface, this is another viewing point to the exhibit that we took a bridge over earlier. However, most of the land section of this exhibit is obscured by a large, densely planted island. Don't worry though, we'll get to the proper viewing area near the end of this post
.
As we reach the end of the Lily pad path and step back onto dry land we can hear the sound of rushing water. It's through the other side of the bushes and rocks though, so we can't actually see any waterfalls. Definitely one nearby though, hopefully we'll get a better view of this later
We're not quite back on the main path just yet, as we're still on a desire path through the jungle. We can hear all sorts of bird calls but we can't actually see any birds at the moment. If we look closely into the bushes, following the nearest bird sound, we might be able to find someone. In between the bushes, perched on a branch, is a beautiful, pale blue bird happily twittering away. This is a Blue-grey tanager, a species I actually saw in the wild during my trip to Suriname!
As we walk over the adventure path through the tall Kapok trees we can see a few small, pink feathers on the ground. If we look up we can see a small group of Roseate spoonbills, which we also saw earlier in O Rio Dourado, in the outside aviary. One of the birds is preening itself, which causes another loose feather to slowly fall to the ground.
The adventure path rejoins the main path and we are once again on solid, hardened ground. Before we continue though, we're all standing still in awe of one of the free-roamers. A Red-rumped agouti has stopped right in the middle of crossing the path. It stares at us for a second, like a deer in headlights, before quickly turning around and running back into the Kapok grove.
I hope you all got a photo of that one, because the Agouti is one of the most elusive animals in the greenhouse. That is... if we don't count the many small tetras and frogs and lizards and.... yeah maybe there's a lot of elusive animals here, but still, that was a cool sighting!
Now, here in the dense jungle section of O Rio Dourado, surrounded by incredibly tall Kapok trees (as well as various smaller trees and bushes of course) we're not exactly short on tall things (pun intended). But there is a large structure that stands out. Next to the main path is a large, wooden tower. The view to the top is obscured by the canopy of the trees, but it's at least 10 or 15 meters tall. There is an entry from this side of the path, but it's blocked by a small hanging sign. "Closed for plot convenience, please wait 'till part 7"
I guess you'll see that later
.
Walking past the giant tower we quickly arrive to the shore of a much larger section of the O Rio Dourado river. Above the path we can see a large amount of hanging nests, carefully woven by weaver birds. Wait a second, aren't weavers native to the old world? Well, that's only true if we're talking about the family Ploceidae, but there are other weaving birds out there. Building their hanging nests in the trees near the river's shore is a huge flock of Red-rumped caciques. We can see one of them exiting their nest before flying off.
Now, once again we arrive at a problem with splitting the greenhouse up into eight pieces. In the river, there's multiple large islands belonging to a large troop of Red-faced black spider monkeys. But technically, these monkey islands and the multiple fascinating and unique design gimmicks of their enclosure and the surrounding river belong to O Rio Dourado part 6. We'll see these islands properly there.
You know, it's getting difficult to try and think of more excuses for us to see the free-roaming frogs when in reality they're practically invisible. What's this now,
oops I dropped my pen let's all look down at the ground where it has rolled between the bushes. Oh,
what's that? It's a Splashback poison frog, a beautiful species with a black belly and a yellow pattern on its back that looks like someone spilled paint all over it. Hence the name, "splashback".
The path takes a bend, seemingly to avoid a very large, fallen tree. In reality, this tree is fake, and is used to hide the barrier of an enclosure for an unusually displayed species. The marshy enclosure is home to Cane toads, a very large species of amphibian native to the Amazon and (in)famously invasive in Australia. Usually held in large terrariums, Wetlands Park Europe houses these animals in a large, open-topped enclosure instead. There's a lot of fallen logs in the exhibit, as well as a shallow aquatic area for them to bathe in.
Walking further along the path we walk past a large boulder to our right. So far, throughout the route, we've been on a slow descent. But at this point, we seem to be in a valley of some kind. The Kapok tree grove that this part of the path loops around is near the middle point of the greenhouse. You wouldn't notice it from the ground, but one of the trees is actually fake. The tallest of the Kapoks is, in truth, a support pillar that holds up the greenhouse's roof. There's a few of these hidden support pillars throughout the greenhouse.
As we look into the grove we can also see an interesting bird species. A grey-winged trumpeter, a ground-dwelling bird species that are actually closely related to cranes, believe it or not. We can see one of them foraging between the leaf litter among a much larger group of Ruddy quail-doves, a rather cute dove species with brown feathers that is built for living terrestrially.
On the other side of the path there's more rocks and multiple small cliffs. There is an adventure path heading inside, but this will actually be a part of area 5. Man, I really wish I could've done this whole thing at once but it's just too big...
As we continue through the jungle we suddenly come into the open as we walk onto a bridge. We've completed a full loop around the large Kapok forest and now we're suddenly in the open as we walk over a large river. To our left is a set of waterfalls and rapids that connect the smaller river area to the large river. These rapids are based on the Blanche Marie falls in Suriname, although a smaller version of it:
One way in that it differs though, is that it is merged with another famous Surinamese waterfall. This being Tapawatra sula. Tapawatra is a huge waterfall/rapids wall that spans multiple hundreds of meters, what makes it so unique is that it's completely overgrown with aquatic plants that seem to thrive in the fast-flowing water. This waterfall in O Rio Dourado has similar plants that grow over the waterfall.
Tapawatra:
Now, replicating a waterfall like Blanche Marie isn't the problem.
Burgers' zoo also has a layered waterfall with a high flow rate. The difference is that Burgers' Zoo's waterfall doesn't have a river full of fish at the top.
Hidden in the rocks and mini-basins between the rapids, as well as at the top of the waterfall, are water jets that add a lot of water into the waterfall. That way this sula has a high flow rate without draining the water from the smaller river.
On the other side of the river, the path takes a few bends, with foliage blocking the view to the large viewing area ahead. This way the giant underwater viewing window comes into the visitor's view all at once. This colossal,
30 meter long viewing window provides an underwater view into a large basin full of fish life. Large pieces of driftwood, as well as some fake trees not only provide shelter, but also create fenced off areas filled with plants. Why do the plants need to be fenced off, you ask? Well, this lake is also home to a few semi-terrestrial animals.
This habitat, which we've looked into a few times before on the route, is the indoor habitat for Brazilian tapirs and Capybaras. A few of the protected plant areas are built against the viewing window, others are a little further in. This way, you can see the tapirs and capybaras swimming/wading in the open water, and see the more timid tetras and cichlids in the plant section.
Immediately recogniseable among the many fishes is a large school of gentle giants: Black pacu, fruit-eating piranhas that are the heaviest of the American tetras. A school of over 30 Black pacus call this pool home. We can also see multiple medium-sized cichlids. Such as a school of Severums staying at the edge of the planted area, and a large school of Eartheaters swimming along the bottom of the lagoon.
Near the window at the water's surface, we can see two large Silver arowanas. A different species from the Black arowanas in the river, but with a very similar build and size. Also visible in the open area are Threespot headstanders and beautiful Sharpnose pike-cichlids, both of which have some very nice patterns.
Taking a closer look at the planted areas, we can see an array of tetras seeking refuge. Tiny Cardinal tetras, slighly larger Redeye tetras, and Bluespot copellas, which are roughly in between the two in terms of size, can be seen swimming between the dense underwater plantings.
On top of some of the semi-submerged logs, there's multiple epiphytes, as well as some larger plants with their roots hanging in the water. Between these roots we can see Striped headstanders, a fish species named after the way they swim with their heads pointed down.
On one of the large logs fencing off the plant area, we can see a large pleco with beautiful golden spots. This is a Goldie pleco, also known as a Sunshine pleco, happily eating algae that have been growing in the basin. What's more interesting, however, is the fish species we can see inside the log. This fake piece of wood is hollow inside, and if we look really closely, we can see that there's actually a fish species inside. The nocturnal Black ghost knifefish likes to hide away either between plants or in one of the many hollow logs during the day. Seeing this animal out and about during the day would be a huge rarity, even seeing it hidden in a log close to the window already takes a lot of luck!
The ground of this viewing plaza is sloped. Closer to the window, the path is lower down, providing a view into the deeper water. Towards the back, we can see over the glass wall and get a good view of Kapuwa Syoro, the Capybara beach. Since it's a sunny day outside, most of the capybaras and tapirs are currently outside in their large, island marsh exhibit. What we can see, though, is a group of Arrau river turtles. With new imports from America, O Rio Dourado will have the largest group of these rare turtles in Europe. Although that doesn't say much, since there aren't that many. A group of 12 animals call this beach home, and all of them are currently basking on the beach in a row.
Wait a second... 9, 10, 11, 12... there's more than 12 animals in a row here. If we look through our camera lenses / binoculars / if you put two fists over your eye and pretend it's a spyglass, we can see that a few of the dark-colours blobs on the syoro are actually ducks! Free-roaming American comb ducks have taken a near-permanent residence on the Tapir beach. Despite being allowed in most of the greenhouse, they just seem to prefer chilling with the capybaras. To be fair, who wouldn't?
Kapuwa syoro also has multiple planted areas on land, similarly protected from the larger residents. In some of the trees in the habitats we can see multiple bright yellow forms. Judging by the loud squawks these are not fruit, and judging by the photo we took of the giant free-roamers mural, these are Golden parakeets, which are happily screaming at each other, as parrots often do.
The final animal we see before I finish off area 4, is the Brazilian teal. We can see a few of them sitting on one of the logs in the lagoon. One of them jumps off the log and into the water to go for a little swim. From the viewing window we can see the duck from underwater, which is an interesting perspective to say the least.
Leaving behind the giant lagoon, the path takes us further and further towards the back of the greenhouse...
I'll see you all in a week or two for Part 5!
Species of area 4:
Kapuwa syoro:
