Snapshot of aguara guasu: ethnography of participatory monitoring with camera traps in Paso Centurión, Uruguay

Abstract

In 2013, an ambiguous camera trap photograph called into question the extinction of the maned wolf in Uruguayan territory. This record, taken within the framework of participatory monitoring with camera traps carried out in Paso Centurión, a protected area in the department of Cerro Largo, Uruguay, give rise to anthropological reflections on different forms of knowledge and relationships between humans and animals that meet, dialogue and tense up. This work is based on an ethnography on dialogues between local and biological knowledge, focusing in particular on a participatory monitoring with camera traps developed by a civil organization that combines biology and environmental activism in the locality. We focus on the relationships with one of the recorded animals, the maned wolf, to discuss its categorization as a rare, present or elusive species and its becoming an emblem of monitoring.

Keywords:
aguara guasu; participatory monitoring; camera traps; ethnography