±«Óãtv

‘Oso oso’ came our field assistant’s cry as we crashed through the cloud forest carrying all the kit in search of our subject. Coming to a stop we heard it before we saw it, climbing a tree right in front of us was an Andean bear, the bear Paddington is based on. Also known as Spectacled bears but not all of them we would learn have spectacles, they are great climbers and come to feed from miles around, not on marmalade sandwiches, but little avocados in a reserve called Maquipucuna in Ecuador. They are the only bear in South America and make such a loud sound with their claws as they climb up the trees it reverberates around the forest. Not only that but to get to the ripe fruit they teeter out onto the edge of thin branches looking like they could fall at any moment snapping the trees. They would then pull the branches back towards them to feed. You could always tell where a bear had been as there would be discarded branches on the floor and in trees looking like a nest where they had eaten dinner and then promptly fallen asleep.

Despite the bears being fairly timid and elusive (some scientists studying them have never seen them) they seemed to really like our camera traps and we would often come back to a crime scene of devastation with our cameras pulled off trees and sometimes nowhere near where we left them. Reviewing the evidence you couldn’t help but chuckle despite the annoyance of not getting any shots as they shoved their noses in the lens before they threw the camera to the ground.