Twenty years ago, the boto was a data-deficient species that scientists thought was relatively stable, but in 2018 it was classified as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. While the boto legend lingers, the actual animals are dying out. Read: Why the long face, extinct dolphin? It’s about the things we don’t talk about.” “We’re trying to show the dark side behind it. “I don’t think most people know the true reason for the boto story,” Mateus tells me through a translator. Their mission is to reveal the chronic abuse that the boto has long been used to hide. Mateus and Pinto are members of a group called Filhas do Boto Nunca Mais-Daughters of the Dolphin, Never Again-which combats sexual violence in Porto Velho and nearby river communities. But the fanciful tales about shape-shifting botos are also used to obscure the realities of life along the river: If a woman becomes pregnant because she was forced into prostitution, or assaulted by a community member, a boto can be conjured up to explain the situation. In Porto Velho, images of cute, smiling botos are ubiquitous on murals and in graffiti. In the Brazilian Amazon and its surrounding communities, stories about animals are a major part of cultural life, and are often used to make sense of what happens in the river’s murky depths. It is said that the botos are so seductive that women wind up pregnant with their babies. According to one myth, the botos transform into handsome men by night, and come ashore dressed in white suits and white hats. While the botos have a reputation for leading fishers to areas rich with fish, they are also known for luring them to dangerous areas and deliberately confusing navigators and sinking their boats. But the ribeirinhos, the people who live on the banks of the Amazon and its tributaries, have had a long and complicated relationship with the species. Scientists didn’t begin to systematically study the behavior or population dynamics of botos outside captivity until the early 1990s. The rosier their skin, the more likely they are to sire calves, perhaps because potential mates are attracted to this evidence of aggression. Their characteristic Millennial-pink hue, found mostly in males, is thought to be caused by the injuries and scarring they sustain in fights with each other. We see nothing.īotos can grow to about nine feet long, with humps on their backs in place of dorsal fins. He points to the right, convinced he sees two huddled together, and steers us toward the spot.
Amazon river dolphin driver#
Our boat driver tells us that the dolphins are probably all around us he sees them frequently. Every once in a while, something pierces the surface-a large splash or a bright flash of color-and we point excitedly, hoping to confirm a sighting of a pink river dolphin, also called a boto. Along with Miriam Pereira Mateus and Ileziane da Silva Pinto, two women in their 30s, I’m peering at the water, which is as opaque as milky coffee. I ’m on a speedboat on the Rio Madeira, which translates to “wood river,” near the Brazilian city of Porto Velho in the upper Amazon River basin.
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