Kanuku Mountains Expedition Day 5

Jim Sanderson.

Jim Sanderson holds you in the unwavering stare he may have picked up from the cats he now studies. Sweating in the bush or rigging up his hammock, Jim is a great example of a change in careers. He went back to school for a Ph.D. in his late 30's. "It was great to go back to school. I felt like all the teachers were talking to me."

Jim received his Ph.D. in landscape ecology from the University of New Mexico in 1976. He has studied small cats using radio-telemetry technology and camera trapping methodology in order to survey wildlife populations and monitor biodiversity. Most recently, he initiated a camera trapping campaign in the Cardamom Mountains of Cambodia. Jim's photograph of the rarest of all cats, the Andean Mountain cat, appeared in the February 2000 issue of National Geographic.

Jim is happiest trudging around the world looking for cats,as he is now on this RAP Expedition. "Will it work? Can we save the big cats (Jim's current specialty)?" I ask him. "Conservation can only be done on the ground. All day, everyday, working with the people who live there," he reminds me. Jim Sanderson is proof that it is never too late to follow your path.

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