Will Johnson: So tell us about Sancho. Just how adorable is this little guy?
Peter Gros: Oh, he's an amazing animal. The first time you see him he's just a few weeks old, and you fall in love with him. You tend to anthropomorphize and think of him as a puppy or a pet, the sort of animal that you'd never like to see reintroduced to the wild, but this wonderful Brazilian veterinarian, Carolina Vargas, does a great job getting up at 5 o'clock every morning, bottle-raising him, and reintroducing him, and teaching him to become a wild otter again.

Will Johnson: What was your impression of researcher Caroline Vargas and her methods?
Peter Gros: Well I think she's one of the most devoted researchers that I've ever seen. She spent hours and hours in the water along with predators that live in the water doing whatever it took to reintroduce this young otter, and then she had to face the tough decision of whether or not to reintroduce Sancho back to the wild.

Will Johnson: What were some of the biggest obstacles facing Sancho's eventual return to the wild?
Peter Gros: One would, since he had to be bottle-raised would he be too imprinted on people? He was very bonded to Carolina. And another was to be sure he was going to be enough of a wild otter to make it in the wild again. It was a tough decision. There are predators in the wild, and other otters don't readily accept strangers. They're very territorial and actually have been known to kill foreign otters. So that was a concern as well, not to mention crocodilians that tend to eat them when they're very small.

Will Johnson: It must have been tough for Caroline to release Sancho into the wild after they'd gotten so close.
Peter Gros: Oh absolutely. I can't imagine what that would've been like, weighing the pros and cons. But on the other hand what kind of a life would an otter have that was afraid of the water? This one was hand-raised on land in the beginning and was absolutely afraid to go in the water. So she had to teach Sancho to swim in the water, to evade predators and to catch fish. She actually taught him to catch fish. There are these wonderful photographs of the otter diving in a muddy, water-filled kiddy pool where Carolina's teaching him to fish. Then eventually, Carolina plays fetch with Sancho by tossing fish back into the river where the otter will hopefully someday live.

Continued »