The sun was shining that beautiful morning and I was excited to see our new Reptile and Animal Rescue Center. After all, being the new intern, it was my first time visiting exotic animals in Costa Rica!

I knew that in this kind of place the animals have been rescued for different reasons, but I didn’t know why.  Rodolfo, the founder and director (really nice guy) was there to explain to us all about their stories.

One might wonder, ”Why do these animals have to be there? Why don’t they give them freedom?”  Each animal has a different story, but the main reason is that some people want to keep a wild animal like a pet. They get them when they are puppies, living all their lives with humans, and later, they abandon or look for places like this rescue center and donate their pets to them. What happens later? These people are not aware about what are they doing. After this, almost half life living with humans, they will not able to return to their natural habitat. They didn’t learn how to survive in the jungle, so most likely they will not be accepted by the other animals, nor would they know how to fend for themselves. It’s a near certainty that they would die. It sounds harsh, but this is the reality.

One of the things that impacted us most was the case of the crocodile named “Sobek.” Some hunters caught him and for an unknown reason they cut his front legs off. He lost this mobility that they need for hunting and to live like a normal reptile.

“Why people could do this such of things to the animals?”  Money, excitement, just to waste time? We honestly don’t know why. There are a lot of things that we can do nothing about. It’s something sad…but at least there are people aware of this problem and doing something to try and fix it. For this we can be proud.

One thing is clear: we are living with a lot of different animal species, and the most dangerous among us who can destroy the beauty of the Earth is ourselves.

Written by intern Óscar Carratalá Climent.