Student Research Trip to Patagonia
Donation protected
This 3 week expedition will bring me and a group of other University of Connecticut students to Southern Patagonia of Chile. Our time there will be spent studying the "Gaucho" culture, biodiversity, and wild horses. The gaucho culture is closely linked to horses and dogs, a way of dressing, music, food, and more than anything else, a nomadic lifestyle. Although they have settles in ranches, the majority of gauchos maintain their traditions. This ancient culture is disappearing as their ranches have changed from large ranches with hundreds of thousands of sheep, and hundreds of horses and dogs, to small ranches with only a few thousand livestock, a handful of horses, and practically no dogs.
During this trip we will spend the first 11 days learning about how the gauchos maintain their culture, and their way of managing horses; the most important tool of the gaucho lifestyle. We will travel to different ranches, to learn about the methods of running a successful livestock operation in this extremely rural area.
We will spend 3 days in Torres del Paine National Park. There we will be surveying wild horses, and studying them from a distance. Patagonian wild horses are completely unmanaged, their population controlled only by their natural predator, the puma. This makes them an interesting breed to study, as most "wild" or feral horses are managed by a government or state. The Patagonian wild horses are thought to have descended from an ancient native breed, which would make them one of few truly wild horse breeds.
It has been a lifelong goal of mine to study wild horses. Ever since I was given the opportunity to volunteer for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and to adopt my own wild horse, it has been my ambition to someday work for the BLM researching American Mustangs. This trip would be an incredible start down this path, and has the potential to open the door for future research opportunities.
Any and all contributions to help me to go on this trip would be incredible. You would be a major contributor to my journey in better understanding this world and the creatures we share it with. I am so appreciative and
you have my wholehearted thanks.
During this trip we will spend the first 11 days learning about how the gauchos maintain their culture, and their way of managing horses; the most important tool of the gaucho lifestyle. We will travel to different ranches, to learn about the methods of running a successful livestock operation in this extremely rural area.
We will spend 3 days in Torres del Paine National Park. There we will be surveying wild horses, and studying them from a distance. Patagonian wild horses are completely unmanaged, their population controlled only by their natural predator, the puma. This makes them an interesting breed to study, as most "wild" or feral horses are managed by a government or state. The Patagonian wild horses are thought to have descended from an ancient native breed, which would make them one of few truly wild horse breeds.
It has been a lifelong goal of mine to study wild horses. Ever since I was given the opportunity to volunteer for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and to adopt my own wild horse, it has been my ambition to someday work for the BLM researching American Mustangs. This trip would be an incredible start down this path, and has the potential to open the door for future research opportunities.
Any and all contributions to help me to go on this trip would be incredible. You would be a major contributor to my journey in better understanding this world and the creatures we share it with. I am so appreciative and
you have my wholehearted thanks.
Organizer
Rayna Mitzman
Organizer
Storrs, CT