When I think back over the last month, dozens of images come to mind. I am reminded of the many things we have learned during Project Peru 2, and the challenges that our team has overcome with your guidance and help. In a way all of the plants and animals in the rainforest rely on each other to survive in the same way that Warren, Ruben, Anna, Patrick, and I rely on each other.

If you removed any member of our team, the rest of us would suffer. We have developed a system of team work and respect for each other. We have learned that the small things keep us working together as a team. Thanking someone for cooking dinner, telling others they are doing a good job, and sympathizing with a team member when they have had a hard day strengthens the bonds between us that ensure our survival.

The plants, animals, and people of the rainforest also rely on each other to survive. They build relationships, and require knowledge, resources, and skills necessary to maintain the delicate balance that allows thousands of different species to survive in the Amazon Rainforest. If a large section of forest is destroyed, or a species becomes extinct, it affects all of the other plants and animals in the forest.

The keys to keeping the forest healthy are knowledge and practice: just like working as a team. Getting to know my fellow team members has allowed me to learn their strengths and weaknesses, and figure out how they fit into our team. The more we practice working together, the stronger we become, which allows us to tackle even greater challenges.

The rainforest has learned how to maintain a healthy balance over thousands of years of trial and error. We need to learn as much as we can about the forest, so that we know how to help protect the plants, animals, and people that live there. We also need to work to protect large sections of rainforest so that the plants and animals have places, or habitat, to maintain the intricate relationships, which allow the forest to thrive.

I plan to continue to learn more about the flooded forest, and will work hard to raise awareness about this irreplaceable ecosystem. I hope that you will also continue to learn and explore this amazing place.

What can you do to continue to learn about and protect the Amazon Rainforest?

Keep Exploring!
Dave

Thank you for joining us and providing with some many great ideas, questions, and knowledge. I look forward to visiting with many of you during our post-adventure school visits. If you have not set up a school visit yet, please contact me at dave@wildernessclassroom.com, or give us a call at 312-505-9973 to schedule a visit.

I would also like to thank Eric, Andrew, and Amy for all of their hard work maintaining the website during Project Peru 2, and the dozens of volunteers, sponsors, partnering organizations, and private donors who have helped us produce Project Peru 2.

Monday's Dilemma seemed to spark many Student Explorer's imagination. From your suggestions we are planning to draft several letters to communities, government officials, and park officials explaining that tourism could bring a lot of money to region. However, tourists want to see as many animals as possible. Therefore we will suggest a system where locals can hunt limited numbers of animals in exchange in volunteering as conservationists and park rangers. We will also suggest ways to cater to tourists' needs and describe why they would want to come to the flooded forest.

We have seen tons of cool animals in the Peruvian rainforest. The great wealth of sun, water, nutrients and fresh air has made the Amazon rainforest alive with more life than any other place on earth. But life is not easy in the jungle; it is a world of endless life-or-death competition for survival. Trees and plants compete for sunlight and soil, while monkeys and macaws compete for the trees' fruits. The constant pressures of survival have made life forms develop unique natural advantages or specialized adaptations.

It seems as though every living organism in the jungle is highly adapted and most species are interdependent (known as mutualism). This means that they create a relationship where they help each other survive. For example, fire ants protect the Cecropia tree from vines and predators, and in return receive a perfect nest site. During the flood, many trees rely on certain fish to eat their fruit and at the same time, the fish disperse the plant's seeds for the coming dry season.

Several fish species have developed pectoral fins that they can use to walk across the forest floor when the floodwaters return to the river channel. The flexible river dolphins use sonar to locate their prey. Fish and many insects use their sense of smell to find food sources. Birds use keen senses of sight and hearing. Some animals, like monkeys, are arboreal (living in the trees); they use natural highways over 100 feet above ground. Arboreal animals have developed great balance, strong hands, feet or claws, and some use a prehensile tail as another way to hold on.

Pacaya Samaria National Reserve is a very bio-diverse region- meaning many different species of living things live there. Thanks to the help of our guides, Ruben and Warren, we've seen and recorded over 150 species of mammals, reptiles, birds and insects in the Pacaya Samaria. Keep in mind the most common defensive tactic, used by most animals in the rainforest, is simply to hide- so we were probably seen by many more creatures than listed here.

Patrick

It has been a great honor spending time with the strong, humble, and resourceful people of the Amazon. We have learned so much about how they survive in the flooded forest. One common theme holds true in every village: the people that live in the rainforest depend on the land and the rivers for their survival. From the moment they wake up, they gather resources from the rainforest: wood for their cooking fires, papaya, bananas, and other foods from their gardens, and fish from the rivers. They use the valuable yucca root in all forms: fried, boiled, as the main ingredient in bread, and even in beer. They gather their meat from hunting animals such as the monkey, paca, and peccary. They build their houses using rainforest trees such as the mighty kapok and vines such as the tamishi.

The rainforest is their medicine cabinet. People use plants, such as the una de gato to prevent illness and to treat some types of cancer. Wild senna is used to treat fungal infections. During labor, women drink a tea made of coca leaves to stimulate contractions. After the birth of the baby, they drink the sap, or milk, from the capinuri tree to speed up the recovery process. The list of medicinal plants goes on and on.

People must build their only means of transportation, dugout canoes, out of trees from the rainforest. This process takes up to two weeks of hard labor. They wash their dishes, clothes, food, and bodies in the rivers. They gather their water for cooking and drinking from that same plentiful resource: the river.

The way the people in the rainforest live makes sense to me. This massive lowland forest of plants, trees, and animals provides everything the people need to be happy, healthy, and wholesome. They are thankful for all that the rainforest that gives them life.

As I continue on my path, I will carry the countless gifts and lessons that my new rainforest friends have given me. Thank you great forest for providing for us, and thank you friends for bringing me back to the Earth.

May the forest be with you,

Anna