Monitoring is an essential part of any reintroduction programme. The pictures from the camera traps showed that the tapir Macacu, reintroduced last October, was very injured, as the result of clashes with other tapirs. “Macacu” was placed back in an acclimatization enclosure for treatment, where it spent a month to heal wounds and gain weight under the supervision of the veterinarian Jeferson Pires, who is also a professor at Estácio de Sá University in Rio de Janeiro, and the care of Sidnei. Macacu recovered well and is now again free in REGUA’s forests still being  monitored. This is the moment when Macacu is leaving the acclimatization enclosure!

The reintroduction of tapirs in the state of Rio de Janeiro is an initiative of Refauna wild animal’s reintroduction programme in partnership with the Reserve and Petrobras funded project Guapiaçu III.