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Teen Travels to Belize
By Teresa Dickert
What's better than seeing animals at the Milwaukee County Zoo? Going to visit them in the wild! Natasha Bolz, 16, of Port Washington, WI, had a great opportunity last summer. She observed tapirs, birds, spider monkeys, and crocodiles thanks to the Belize & Beyond program. This joint program run by We Energies and the Zoological Society of Milwaukee (ZSM) brought Natasha, five other high school students, and one teacher to Belize, a country in Central America.
The journey to Belize started with Natasha's ecology class at Port Washington High School. The class focused on animals and their habitats. "ZSM and We Energies gave presentations on global warming, energy sources and conservation, and about different ecosystems and animals, especially birds. The first time we met with them, they told us that six to 10 students would be selected to go to Belize for one week. I immediately began to pursue this." Natasha needed to write three essays. One was about climate changes around the world. Another was about plants and animals that invade places they shouldn’t be and push out other species. "The third was on how I would benefit from going to Belize and why I wanted to go."
Natasha did two other projects including a poster describing the effects of forest fragmentation (when large, continuous forests are divided into smaller sections as a part of development). Natasha was a finalist and, after an interview, won a spot on the Belize trip.
What was it like in Belize? "The birds were very exotic. Every morning we would wake up and hear their calls." Natasha got to jump right into the Belizean environment, literally, by swimming in a lagoon in northern Belize and canoeing through mangroves (swamps lined with trees that have roots sometimes growing above the ground). She hiked in a tropical forest, climbed Maya temples, and went on a night safari. In western Belize, she enjoyed the Belize Botanic Garden. North of Belize City, the capital, she got very close to black howler monkeys, affectionately called "baboons" by some of the local people, at the Community Baboon Sanctuary. In central Belize, she was fascinated by fluttering insects at Green Hills Butterfly Ranch and the rare jabiru stork at the Belize Zoo.
What does she remember most? Crocodile shining – using a light to make the eyes of crocodiles shine in the dark of night. "I have never seen a crocodile so close to me. One swam right under our boat."
She didn't learn only about Belizean animals. "I learned about a different culture, environment, ecosystems." For example, she never saw "bleeding trees," tarantulas or mangroves in Wisconsin. "I understand more fully global warming, conservation, and (that)... everything a person does affects the environment somehow... Conserving the tropical forest in Belize helps keep it natural and keep the habitats the animals need. Even though we may not always save a forest in Wisconsin, we can somewhere else, and it will still be beneficial."
