How hard can it be to find a giant?

摘要

"There's nothing to fear in the Pantanal," announced field co-ordinator Ellen Wang at our orientation meeting. "Apart from the peccaries, which will bite you given half a chance (so make sure your tree-climbing abilities are up to scratch), the piranhas and stingrays lurking in the cold, deep waters of the river (so shuffle, don't walk), the pit vipers that may climb into your boots if you leave them outside (so don't), and two species of blood-sucking bat, which don't normally bite humans." With these words of encouragement, I arrived in Brazil's Pantanal, the world's largest wetland and home to the greatest concentration of- mainly benign - wildlife in South America. I was joining a research project, run by environmental charity Earthwatch, studying the ecology of the giant otter Pteronura brasiliensis and its smaller cousin, the neotropical river otter Lontra longicaudis.