By Alejandro Rigatuso, Fundador y Director de Fundación Loros
For months, we had heard nothing of Loreta. The last time we saw her, she spread her wings toward a tall jobo tree and never looked back. Perhaps she went looking for Lorenzo. Perhaps she was simply ready. Loreta is number 14 — an Amazona amazonica who arrived at Fundación Loros after spending her entire childhood in a cage in Cartagena: she didn't know how to fly, and when she finally learned, she didn't want to. That kind of story makes reintegration slower, more uncertain. So when she left, we were left standing there, hope clenched tight in our hands.
On February 20th, 2026, she appeared perched on the wooden fence — her tag still hanging, and the mountains of Villanueva rising behind her, green upon green. Free and whole. Her feathers carried the same flashes of yellow and red as always, but something about her was different: she was no longer the parrot who hesitated.
This return cannot be understood without the neighbors of Villanueva — those who plant papayas, cerezos, mangos, and jobos, and who share their days comfortably with the loros that pass through their branches. It is they who sustain, without fully knowing it, the world that Loreta chose to belong to.
About the author
Alejandro Rigatuso · Fundador y Director de Fundación Loros
Alejandro Rigatuso arrived at Fundación Loros after years as Vice President of Growth Marketing at Toptal, bringing with him an unconventional perspective: he knows an animal is well by its eyes, "bright, wide open." Lorenzo, the first parrot released, recaptured several times and always set free to fly again, marked him forever. At dusk, around five-thirty, you'll find him at the Mirador de las Ciénagas or wandering around Cerro El Peligro, envisioning observation towers and hundreds of native parrots soaring over a reserve that an entire community calls their own.
