About Us
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds
IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival Brazil
Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)
          

About Us
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds
IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival Brazil
Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)
   

Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)
“Aves da Mata Atlântica”

Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)
“Aves da Mata Atlântica”

Ligia Oliva, head of the Veterinary Division of Parque das Aves, and Roberta Manacero, CAFS’ coordinator, performing an endoscopic procedure in a rescued animal.

A treatment and rehabilitation center for rescued fauna, specialising in birds of the Atlantic Rainforest, run in partnership with the government of the State of Paraná.

The Atlantic Rainforest is 91,5% deforested in its primary state, and the Brazilian State of Paraná is the federal state with the largest area and proportion of Atlantic Rainforest remaining in the country. A principal threat to many endangered species of bird is animal trafficking, and thousands of birds are rescued by the authorities every year. In partnership with the State government, Claravis set up this Center in order to receive birds confiscated from trafficking or injured by various means and in need of rehabilitation. This Center works to rehabilitate and, based on individual evaluation and following sound principles, release birds responsibly whenever possible. In other cases, when this is not possible, birds will be destined to high-quality institutions and threatened species can become part of structured ex-situ conservation programs. The two principal strategic aims of CAFS are to ensure welfare of individual birds and, when necessary, other fauna, and to ensure that birds of threatened species in need of rehabilitation are given the best possible chance to contribute to the conservation of their kind.

CAFS Aves da Mata Atlântica is located on a 14-hectare site in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil dedicated to rescue and conservation breeding. The property is owned by Parque das Aves, separate from the Parque das Aves visitation site. Parque das Aves donates use of the space as well as staff resources to CAFS, and the Center is audited and run in partnership with IAT (Instituto Água e Terra), the State government’s institute for nature conservation.

Paloma Bosso, technical director of Parque das Aves, and Mathias Dislich, head of the Research Division, examining a rescued Wood Stork (Mycteria americana) after a delicate surgery.

Dr Carmel Croukamp

President
Instituto Claravis

 

Carmel received her Bachelors and Doctoral degrees at the University of Oxford. She is the daughter of the founders of Parque das Aves, and took over the running of Parque das Aves as CEO in 2014. In 2016, Carmel came to understand that a species of her backyard, the forests of Iguaçu, named Claravis geoffroy, had likely gone extinct, and that the extinction of Claravis was part of a wave of extinctions starting to sweep through the birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. As a result, Parque das Aves underwent an institutional change in order to focus on conservation of birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. The Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds and the IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival as well as Instituto Claravis itself were founded as part of this initiative. Carmel sits on the Technical Advisory Board of the Brazilian Government's National Action Plan for the Birds of the Atlantic Rainforest (ICMBio PAN Aves da Mata Atlântica), on the Board of Directors of Global Conservation Network (GCN) which oversees the IUCN SSC Conservation Planning Specialist Group and the Amphibian Ark institute, is a member of the Conservation Committee of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums and a councillor of the Iguaçu National Park, amongst other board memberships and directorships.

Paloma Bosso, MSc

Superintendent
Instituto Claravis

 

Paloma is a veterinarian and received her Master's Degree in Veterinary Science, at the Animal Welfare Laboratory of the Federal University of Paraná. She also has a specialization (lato sensu) in Wild Animal Husbandry (in situ e ex situ) from the Catholic Pontifical University from Belo Horizonte and participated in the Professional Development Program of São Paulo Zoo in their Animal Behavioral Enrichment Sector. She is a specialist in animal behaviour and welfare and Paloma's principal passions are overseeing high standards of welfare, integrated conservation and conservation contributions of ex-situ populations of threatened species. Paloma is co-founder of the Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds, IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival and Claravis Institute and established the Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS) "Aves da Mata Atlântica" in 2021. She has been the Technical Director of Parque das Aves since 2017. She has overseen Parque das Aves' institutional transformation to focus on birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. She is a member of the Welfare Committee of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), and an accreditation inspector at the Latin American Association of Zoos and Aquaria (ALPZA). She was a member of the Ethics, Bioethics and Animal Welfare Commission of the Federal Veterinary Council in Brazil, and Executive Director of the Brazilian Association of Zoos and Aquaria (AZAB).

Dr Ben Phalan

Director
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Ben is an ornithologist and conservation biologist, who received his Bachelor's degree at Trinity College Dublin and Doctoral degree from the University of Cambridge. He has worked over the years for BirdWatch Ireland, British Antarctic Survey, Oregon State University and the Federal University of Bahia. His research has focused primarily on how to reconcile food production and other human demands with biodiversity conservation. He published the first full empirical assessment of the land sparing/sharing framework, based on fieldwork in Ghana. He led an expedition to Liberia in search of the Liberian Greenbul, a "lost", Critically Endangered West African endemic, helping to confirm that it had never been a valid species. His work now is focused on planning, implementing and supporting actions to protect and restore populations of the most imperilled bird species of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest.

Dr Fabiana Lopes Rocha

Coordinator
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Fabiana is a wildlife veterinarian and ecologist, and received her Master's degree from Federal University of Mato Grosso do Sul and Doctoral degree from Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. She is an advisor in Ecology, environmental monitoring and Zoology at the Federal University of Paraiba (UFPB). Her academic interest is in the areas of ecology, parasitology, and conservation of wild mammals, with an emphasis on carnivores and One Health. She is the convenor of the Conservation Planning Specialist Group - CPSG Brasil and member of the Cerrado´s mammal conservation program, Conservation Medicine Brazilian Institute and researcher of Laboratory of mammals and evolution (UFPB). Her work now focuses on bringing global standards, global connectivity and improved capacity for regional efforts for species assessment, planning and action within governments and NGOs as well as other relevant stakeholders to prevent species extinctions.

Dr Gláucia Seixas

Coordinator
Blue-fronted Amazon Project
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Gláucia is a Zootechnician with a Master’s and Doctorate in Ecology and Nature Conservation, and for the last 30 years has dedicated herself to nature conservation. In 1997, while working at a Center for Rehabilitation of Fauna in Mato Grosso do Sul, she founded the Blue-fronted Amazon Project. With the support of Parque das Aves, Naples Zoo and Fundação Neotrópica, she and her team work in the conservation of the Blue-fronted Amazon and its habitat, as well as in the fight against illegal trade, in Mato Grosso do Sul and beyond. For 20 years field activities were concentrated in the Pantanal of Mato Grosso do Sul and in 2015 they were expanded to the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado of Mato Grosso do Sul.

Rosana Subira

Red List Officer
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Rosana is a biologist with a Master's Degree in Ecology from the University of Brasília. She has worked for almost 20 years in public administration roles related to wildlife conservation. Her experience includes project management and coordination of multidisciplinary teams in the implementation of work on a national scale, biodiversity risk assessment in terrestrial and marine environments, conservation planning and proposing and implementing measures to address impacts on biodiversity. Through these activities she has developed a network of contacts with people from the most diverse sectors and interests, including researchers, community members and public administrators from various regions of Brazil, and has developed skills in conflict management and constructing collective agreements. She started her career working with primates, but her interests soon expanded to the entire fauna.

Dr Eugenia Cordero Schmidt

Officer
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Eugenia is a Costa Rican biologist, who received her Bachelor's degree at Universidad de Costa Rica and Master's and Doctoral degrees in Ecology at the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte. She has worked for the past eleven years with bats. Her most recent research has focused on the interactions between nectar-feeding bats and plants in the threatened Caatinga. She has also worked with ecology and conservation projects in Costa Rica and northeastern Brazil and participated in bat conservation strategies in Central America, using environmental education and communication as essential tools. Her work now is focused on planning for species conservation and communication where her creativity and ability to adapt are put into practice every day.

Tony Bichinski, MSc

Conservation Assistant
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Tony graduated in Forestry Engineering from the Latin American Union of Technology, and received a Master's degree in Natural Resources from the Federal University of Roraima. Since childhood, he has been interested in the reproductive cycle of birds and he started to collect data on the breeding biology of Brazilian species from the age of 13. Over 20 years of field research, he has visited different habitats in all the biomes of the country, collecting detailed and unique data on more than 400 species, adding up to a total of more than 7000 nests with information collected in the wild. Currently, he is an Environmental and Forestry Consultant for several companies. His work with Instituto Claravis focuses on integrated conservation of threatened birds, with a focus on the Atlantic Rainforest, including the Alagoas Antwren, Black-fronted Piping-guan, and Blue-eyed Ground Dove.

Caio Prates

Assistant
Blue-fronted Amazon Project
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Caio was born and raised in Ivinhema, in Mato Grosso do Sul, where he gained a degree in Biological Sciences at the State University of Mato Grosso do Sul, graduating in December 2017. He got to know the Blue-fronted Amazon Project in mid-2018, when he served as a volunteer on two field expeditions. That experience left him keen to join the Project team to contribute to the conservation of the species and help combat illegal trade in parrot chicks. In August 2019 he was hired as a Research Assistant for the Blue-fronted Amazon Project for Instituto Claravis. His salary is kindly funded by Naples Zoo at Caribbean Gardens, Florida, USA. Caio assists the Project coordinator, Gláucia Seixas in monitoring nests and delivering environmental education activities in local communities.

Roberta Manacero, MSc

Coordinator
Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)

 

Roberta has a Bachelor's Degree in Veterinary Medicine, Post-graduate Degree in Wild Animals Medicine and Master's Degree in Medicine and Animal Welfare. She was a Resident at the Animal Behavioral Enrichment Program at São Paulo Zoo for three years, member of the Animal Welfare Department of the São Paulo Association of Zoos and Aquariums for four years and took professional courses on training wild animals using operant conditioning in the United States, England and Mexico. She is a professional member of IAATE - International Association of Avian Trainers and Educators - and Studbook Keeper of the grey-breasted parakeet (Pyrrhura griseipectus). Her work is focused on animal records keeping, husbandry and welfare, as she is currently the Animal Curator of Parque das Aves and Coordinator of the Center for Rescue and Rehabilitation of Birds of the Atlantic Rainforest (CAFS Aves da Mata Atlântica) at Instituto Claravis.

Roberta Manacero, MSc

Coordinator
Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS)

 

Roberta has a Bachelor's Degree in Veterinary Medicine, Post-graduate Degree in Wild Animals Medicine and Master's Degree in Medicine and Animal Welfare. She was a Resident at the Animal Behavioral Enrichment Program at São Paulo Zoo for three years, member of the Animal Welfare Department of the São Paulo Association of Zoos and Aquariums for four years and took professional courses on training wild animals using operant conditioning in the United States, England and Mexico. She is a professional member of IAATE - International Association of Avian Trainers and Educators - and Studbook Keeper of the grey-breasted parakeet (Pyrrhura griseipectus). Her work is focused on animal records keeping, husbandry and welfare, as she is currently the Animal Curator of Parque das Aves and Coordinator of the Center for Rescue and Rehabilitation of Birds of the Atlantic Rainforest (CAFS Aves da Mata Atlântica) at Instituto Claravis.

Caio Prates

Assistant
Blue-fronted Amazon Project
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Caio was born and raised in Ivinhema, in Mato Grosso do Sul, where he gained a degree in Biological Sciences at the State University of Mato Grosso do Sul, graduating in December 2017. He got to know the Blue-fronted Amazon Project in mid-2018, when he served as a volunteer on two field expeditions. That experience left him keen to join the Project team to contribute to the conservation of the species and help combat illegal trade in parrot chicks. In August 2019 he was hired as a Research Assistant for the Blue-fronted Amazon Project for Instituto Claravis. His salary is kindly funded by Naples Zoo at Caribbean Gardens, Florida, USA. Caio assists the Project coordinator, Gláucia Seixas in monitoring nests and delivering environmental education activities in local communities.

Tony Bichinski, MSc

Conservation Assistant
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Tony graduated in Forestry Engineering from the Latin American Union of Technology, and received a Master's degree in Natural Resources from the Federal University of Roraima. Since childhood, he has been interested in the reproductive cycle of birds and he started to collect data on the breeding biology of Brazilian species from the age of 13. Over 20 years of field research, he has visited different habitats in all the biomes of the country, collecting detailed and unique data on more than 400 species, adding up to a total of more than 7000 nests with information collected in the wild. Currently, he is an Environmental and Forestry Consultant for several companies. His work with Instituto Claravis focuses on integrated conservation of threatened birds, with a focus on the Atlantic Rainforest, including the Alagoas Antwren, Black-fronted Piping-guan, and Blue-eyed Ground Dove.

Dr Eugenia Cordero Schmidt

Officer
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Eugenia is a Costa Rican biologist, who received her Bachelor's degree at Universidad de Costa Rica and Master's and Doctoral degrees in Ecology at the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte. She has worked for the past eleven years with bats. Her most recent research has focused on the interactions between nectar-feeding bats and plants in the threatened Caatinga. She has also worked with ecology and conservation projects in Costa Rica and northeastern Brazil and participated in bat conservation strategies in Central America, using environmental education and communication as essential tools. Her work now is focused on planning for species conservation and communication where her creativity and ability to adapt are put into practice every day.

Rosana Subira

Red List Officer
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Rosana is a biologist with a Master's Degree in Ecology from the University of Brasília. She has worked for almost 20 years in public administration roles related to wildlife conservation. Her experience includes project management and coordination of multidisciplinary teams in the implementation of work on a national scale, biodiversity risk assessment in terrestrial and marine environments, conservation planning and proposing and implementing measures to address impacts on biodiversity. Through these activities she has developed a network of contacts with people from the most diverse sectors and interests, including researchers, community members and public administrators from various regions of Brazil, and has developed skills in conflict management and constructing collective agreements. She started her career working with primates, but her interests soon expanded to the entire fauna.

Dr Gláucia Seixas

Coordinator
Blue-fronted Amazon Project
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Gláucia is a Zootechnician with a Master’s and Doctorate in Ecology and Nature Conservation, and for the last 30 years has dedicated herself to nature conservation. In 1997, while working at a Center for Rehabilitation of Fauna in Mato Grosso do Sul, she founded the Blue-fronted Amazon Project. With the support of Parque das Aves, Naples Zoo and Fundação Neotrópica, she and her team work in the conservation of the Blue-fronted Amazon and its habitat, as well as in the fight against illegal trade, in Mato Grosso do Sul and beyond. For 20 years field activities were concentrated in the Pantanal of Mato Grosso do Sul and in 2015 they were expanded to the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado of Mato Grosso do Sul.

Dr Fabiana Lopes Rocha

Coordinator
IUCN SSC Centre for Species Survival Brazil

 

Fabiana is a wildlife veterinarian and ecologist, and received her Master's degree from Federal University of Mato Grosso do Sul and Doctoral degree from Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. She is an advisor in Ecology, environmental monitoring and Zoology at the Federal University of Paraiba (UFPB). Her academic interest is in the areas of ecology, parasitology, and conservation of wild mammals, with an emphasis on carnivores and One Health. She is the convenor of the Conservation Planning Specialist Group - CPSG Brasil and member of the Cerrado´s mammal conservation program, Conservation Medicine Brazilian Institute and researcher of Laboratory of mammals and evolution (UFPB). Her work now focuses on bringing global standards, global connectivity and improved capacity for regional efforts for species assessment, planning and action within governments and NGOs as well as other relevant stakeholders to prevent species extinctions.

Dr Ben Phalan

Director
Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds

 

Ben is an ornithologist and conservation biologist, who received his Bachelor's degree at Trinity College Dublin and Doctoral degree from the University of Cambridge. He has worked over the years for BirdWatch Ireland, British Antarctic Survey, Oregon State University and the Federal University of Bahia. His research has focused primarily on how to reconcile food production and other human demands with biodiversity conservation. He published the first full empirical assessment of the land sparing/sharing framework, based on fieldwork in Ghana. He led an expedition to Liberia in search of the Liberian Greenbul, a "lost", Critically Endangered West African endemic, helping to confirm that it had never been a valid species. His work now is focused on planning, implementing and supporting actions to protect and restore populations of the most imperilled bird species of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest.

Paloma Bosso, MSc

Superintendent
Instituto Claravis

 

Paloma is a veterinarian and received her Master's Degree in Veterinary Science, at the Animal Welfare Laboratory of the Federal University of Paraná. She also has a specialization (lato sensu) in Wild Animal Husbandry (in situ e ex situ) from the Catholic Pontifical University from Belo Horizonte and participated in the Professional Development Program of São Paulo Zoo in their Animal Behavioral Enrichment Sector. She is a specialist in animal behaviour and welfare and Paloma's principal passions are overseeing high standards of welfare, integrated conservation and conservation contributions of ex-situ populations of threatened species. Paloma is co-founder of the Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds, IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival and Claravis Institute and established the Wild Fauna Support Center (CAFS) "Aves da Mata Atlântica" in 2021. She has been the Technical Director of Parque das Aves since 2017. She has overseen Parque das Aves' institutional transformation to focus on birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. She is a member of the Welfare Committee of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), and an accreditation inspector at the Latin American Association of Zoos and Aquaria (ALPZA). She was a member of the Ethics, Bioethics and Animal Welfare Commission of the Federal Veterinary Council in Brazil, and Executive Director of the Brazilian Association of Zoos and Aquaria (AZAB).

Dr Carmel Croukamp

President
Instituto Claravis

 

Carmel received her Bachelors and Doctoral degrees at the University of Oxford. She is the daughter of the founders of Parque das Aves, and took over the running of Parque das Aves as CEO in 2014. In 2016, Carmel came to understand that a species of her backyard, the forests of Iguaçu, named Claravis geoffroy, had likely gone extinct, and that the extinction of Claravis was part of a wave of extinctions starting to sweep through the birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. As a result, Parque das Aves underwent an institutional change in order to focus on conservation of birds of the Atlantic Rainforest. The Center for Conservation of Atlantic Rainforest Birds and the IUCN SSC Center for Species Survival as well as Instituto Claravis itself were founded as part of this initiative. Carmel sits on the Technical Advisory Board of the Brazilian Government's National Action Plan for the Birds of the Atlantic Rainforest (ICMBio PAN Aves da Mata Atlântica), on the Board of Directors of Global Conservation Network (GCN) which oversees the IUCN SSC Conservation Planning Specialist Group and the Amphibian Ark institute, is a member of the Conservation Committee of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums and a councillor of the Iguaçu National Park, amongst other board memberships and directorships.