A resident of Lima Sands, Region Two who illegally captured a Jaguar –the national animal of Guyana – placed it in a cage and is collecting a fee for persons to see it; among those paying are government officials.
Marvin Calvan is charging $100 for adults and $60 for children, according to a post made by the Region Two Democratic Council on their Facebook page.
The animal is a small female, about four feet in length from nose to tail.
According to the RDC, the Jaguar was captured using traps set up by residents who have been losing their livestock and dogs for several months.
“Several residents set up these ingenious traps to capture the large cat without causing injury to it or themselves,” the RDC said on its Facebook page.
According to the RDC, the trap was set using a live dog as bait while the other end has the trap door which closes when the animal fully enters.
Calvan told the regional authorities that he made contact with the Zoological park of Guyana which has expressed an interest in taking the Jaguar, however, he said he is not being rewarded for capturing the national animal t and therefore decided to take a small fee from visitors who wish to see this majestic animal at his home in Lima Sands.
Among persons who paid the fee and visited the animal at the weekend were Regional Executive Officer Denis Jaikaran and Regional Engineer Kawan Suchit.
The residents captured another Jaguar recently, weighing 150-pounds, however, they were reportedly tricked into handing over the animal to persons claiming that they were from the Guyana WildLife Authority.
Hunting and killing of the Jaguar is illegal.
The jaguar is Guyana’s national animal, protected by the Wildlife Conservation and Management Act 2016. According to the legislation, collecting, holding in captivity, hunting, killing, or otherwise molesting ‘protected’ species is prohibited.
The animal is also said to be going extinct.
In 2018, the Government expressed its support for a new initiative – Jaguar 2030 Conservation Roadmap, to save the Jaguar which is scientifically named Panthera onca.
The roadmap aims to strengthen the Jaguar Corridor, ranging from Mexico to Argentina, by securing 30 priority jaguar conservation landscapes by the year 2030.
