Ms. Carrie's response to our questions!

Carrie Seltzer said...

Ms. Kruger's class,
I am so excited to answer your questions!

As far as I know, the area of Tanzania where I work does not have problems with illegal monkey collection. Some other animals like snakes and chameleons are legally collected for the pet trade from the forest outside of the nature reserve. There are international agreements that limit how many of each species can be sent to other countries.

Scientists can learn a great deal from observing animals, but we can't always observe them directly. Most primate are active during the day in relatively open areas (trees) where it can be possible to watch them, and many scientists have been able to accustom primates to their presence. Bats and rats are active at night which makes them much harder to see. I am using motion-sensitive cameras to observe rats. For bats my method is even less direct- I observe what bats eat by looking for the scraps they leave behind. Watching ANY kind of animal in whatever friendly way you can is great practice for a young scientist.

Protecting animals' habitats is the most important way to protect them. The Amani Nature Reserve, where I work, was created in 1997 to protect thousands of acres of rainforest from being logged. The forest is home to many species of plants and animals that are very rare! Even just since 1997, much of the forest outside of the nature reserve has been cleared for small farms so it is important that the reserve exists.