Giant Anteater
© Elyssa Kellerman
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The surroundings of Manu Wildlife Center (MWC) allow a visitor an up-close and personal experience with the wildlife of Manu. Of particular interest are the many miles of marked nature trails that lead to specific animal habitats.
A visitor to MWC can explore 40 miles of scientifically-designed forest trails surrounding the lodge. Near the lodge is the famous Blanquillo Macaw and Parrot Clay Lick of Manu where hundreds of parrots and macaws come to eat clay from the river bank. On lakes surrounding MWC the world's most social, yet ferocious, otter, the 70-pound Giant Otter lives.
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Tapir © Andre Bartschi
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Deer at clay lick
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Just before dusk an hour's walk from the lodge leads to a display of tapirs, wiggly-nosed, 550-pound (250-kilo) beasts: the largest land animals in South America. In nearly all parts of the Amazon, tapirs are harder to see than jaguars. Each night at this special place in the Manu jungle, tapirs, deer and occasionally monkeys congregate at a "mammal clay lick". A swampy, muddy pit where the animals eat clay from the banks of the lick.
From a specially built blind above the clay lick MWC researchers and visitors watch as the animals mecca to this spot, the world's largest known tapir clay lick.
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