THINK
GLOBALLY,
ACT LOCALLY
Niños y Crías means "Kids and Critters" in English... and that's who we work with. Niños y Crías has many projects going on at any one time around the Yucatan Peninsula. We're involved with educating children and their parents about the environment. We are all about participation in tracking and observing wildlife, especially flamingos and other birds. And we are active participants in the restoration of habitats for birds and other creatures.
We've got a lot going on, and you are welcome to participate. Explore our website and learn more about us!
Welcome to Niños y Crias!
We are a non-profit organization, established in 1999.
We got our start in the sands of the Ria Lagartos
Biosphere, and our main objective is to give life
and continuity to local environmental education programs,
to help conserve local jungle and water habitats, to
rehabilitate disturbed ecosystems and to develop sustainable
human communities to support the ecosystems.
We decided that it is very important to learn to conserve nature from a very young age, and for this reason, we focus on a very important sector of the public: the CHILDREN.
If we can sensitize and educate those who in the future will be responsible for the health of the planet, we will be forming human beings capable of acting on behalf of the environment. By doing this, we will fulfill the mission that is what we work for every day: “Learn to conserve Nature”.
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Fashionable bags with a message about nature, plush toys, keychains, logo mugs, t-shirts, garbage bags and much more... all profits support the animals! |  |
Happy New Year!
January 2 we started our first year’s activity with the Christmas Bird Count in the Ría Celestún Biosphere Reserve. The team was mostly made up by 4 Celestún children and a teenager that began observing birds in his native Celestun and is now studying high school in Merida, his 2 uncles: Alex and Henry Dzib, who are nature guides as well as children’s teachers in the art of birding, and an animate participant from Niños y Crías A.C. who’s love for birds helped him keep his sanity at such early morning hours to start the count. We gathered near the town park at 7:30 a.m. from where we parted towards the fields via the road to Chunchucmil as first transect. We further covered 5 different habitats to observe a total of 83 bird species, including 17 migratory, among them the Caribbean flamingo of which 40,000 were estimated to be grouped at that beautiful spot. The tireless youngsters did not abandon the count, but maintained their enthusiasm till 5:30 p.m., ending the day with rain and cold weather, making this a good reason for their mothers to prepare them a delicious hot chocolate so that they could dunk their sweet rolls (hacer chuk) or for grandma to give them some sweets from the store. The children made a daring suggestion to free the caged birds, because they look much prettier flying… For starters, they currently account a released Blue Bunting on their list. Good for them!
Photo of the Month
Christmas Bird Count in Celestún
