TOLEDO BLADE (Ohio) 08 August 06 Building the frog hospital (Jenni Laidman)
El Valle De Anton, Panama: It’s after midnight on the grounds of El Nispero Zoo in El Valle, but the construction crew still labors on Panama’s first amphibian conservation center.
When the El Valle Amphibian Conservation Center — or EVACC — was designed a year ago, the plan was to make about half of the 2,400-square-foot building display space for the nation’s frogs. Today, the display area remains incomplete as Dr. Carlos Mauricio Caballero, the zoo’s director, rushes to finish what might be the last home for Panama’s diverse frog population.
El Nispero Zoo is small and old fashioned, with iron-barred cages and concrete floors; the kind of zoo seldom seen in the United States since the 1960s. It started as a hobby, a weekend getaway created by Dr. Caballero’s father and a friend that grew into something more ambitious.
Dr. Caballero, a veterinarian and now the zoo’s director, talks about the outdated displays — there’s an ocelot anyone foolish enough could reach out and touch, for instance — and the changes he hopes to make. It’s a matter of money. The zoo charges $2 for an adult visitor, which sounds like a bargain until one remembers a complete lunch of chicken, beans, rice, and plantains costs the same in town.
The zoo is respected in Panama. When conservation groups were looking for a home for tapirs owned by the ousted dictator Gen. Manuel Noriega, El Nispero was selected.
The amphibian center will be a stark contrast to the rest of the zoo, as near state-of-the-art as possible, with climate control, space for a genetics laboratory, and showers where workers will have to clean off before starting their work day and at its end.
All they have to do is finish the facility.
“I think if everything would have gone to plan, it would have been simple,’’ said Paul Crump, the Houston Zoo keeper helping supervise EVACC construction. “But in my mind, I anticipated a complete nightmare. It’s not quite living up to that yet.’’
It got a bit closer last month, when the local electric company decided it wanted $10,000 to install a transformer and run power to EVACC. During the planning stages, the company said the work could be done for free, Mr. Crump said.
“We didn’t quite budget for that,’’ he said. “We’re going to be pulling so much juice, they would make their money back in less than a year’’ if the company would install the transformer without additional charges.
Once the electricity is connected, it will still be another three to four weeks before frogs can move in. How long it will take to install the transformer is anyone’s guess, Mr. Crump said.
“We’ve been told next week for the last six months,’’ he said.
“We need to extend the rescue at the Hotel Campestre, maybe through August and September,’’ Mr. Crump said. “It’s looking pretty grim.’’
Building the frog hospital