Saving Wildlife

An Ecuadorian farmer translates a love born of a chance encounter in his teens into inspiring and important environmental action, as Vasquez spends hours of his day observing and photographing bears. Danilo Vasquez, who lives in one of the Ecuadorian valleys, met bears from the Andean bear family, or what is known as the spectacled bear, when he was a teenager, and since then he has dedicated his life to caring for bears and preserving their existence, as they are an endangered species and the only indigenous species in South America. While bears are wrongly accused of killing herds, it cannot be denied that they spoil corn crops, which often prompted farmers to try to kill them, which Vasquez was on the lookout for, as he paid from his own pocket the losses incurred by farmers due to bears. Because the cost was high, Vasquez decided to find another way to finance compensation, so he created a tourist attraction on his farm that receives 80 visitors every week. He built a wooden tree house to monitor the bears, in addition to creating a rope swing whose rider overlooks the valley, and many opportunities for photography with stunning views. The Vasquez project succeeded and is now generating money to compensate farmers who have become more familiar with the animals. These animals have also begun to multiply. Fifty years ago, for example, there was not a single bear in the area. Despite the large size of the animals - males weigh more than 100 kilograms - there have been no incidents of attacks on humans in the area. Since the project is too big for one man to continue, Vasquez works as part of Big Mammals Conservation, an Ecuadorian non-governmental organization specializing in preserving the country's wildlife. It received a grant from the local government to fund cameras that film the lives of bears, which cannot be seen without them, as bears are very shy of humans and flee as soon as they smell their scent. It is noteworthy that Andean bears are the inspiration for the famous children's movie character Paddington. For more on Euronews: "Panda diplomacy" revives Russian-Chinese relations Watch: Nature reserve cameras monitor a rare white panda in China A three-year-old American child says that a bear protected him after he got lost for two days in the forest