ONCA is a wildlife rescue center located in the Bolivian Amazon.  We rescue animals who fall victim to illegal trafficking.

Our goal is to rehabilitate them, to give them a new life, the gift of being able to enjoy like they were never taken from their families and habitat.

Being able to release back to the wild is a colossal task, that is not widely accepted in the scientific community, as it needs too much effort to be accomplished, and with a statistically low level of success.

We at ONCA believe that we can carry out this goal, especially with the monkeys, as they are social animals and therefore they learning capabilities are our best ally.

To achieve this we spend many years working on the creation of a group, checking that their social skills are being refined to the point that the monkeys behave with each other in the same way they do in the wild.  This is no easy task as you need specialists that can research to reflect in a study the results of these interactions.

There is plenty to do in the rehab, we could be writing for weeks... so we will go to the main points where we need your help so desperately in this campaign!

One crucial step: their health.  A group of monkeys cannot be completely free if you don't have the assurance that either they won't get sick in the new environment, and more importantly, that they won't carry any parasite or disease to other wildlife.

How we do this? By making a lot of laboratory analysis, special equipment, and chemicals, which generates a lot of costs.  The study Irene is going to carry out is going to require at least 240 samples just for the spider monkey group... 

At the final step, before considering doing a proper reintroduction away from the center, it is imperative to follow the group after being "released" inside ONCA.

Why? So we can assure they are using the same territory patterns as seen in the wild and examine the areas they are foraging in to establish that they can feed themselves.

How can we do this without changing their natural behavior? By using GPS devices, the most expensive equipment for this fundraising!

GPS tracking is a technology that would assess their release narrowing it to the minor error needed in empiric studies.  Not only that, it will give us a tool that could be used in the future with other species when we introduce new members into the groups!

Here is a detailed list of all that is needed: