In the first part he travels south with his wife
Jacquie Durrell and two other female companions to the town of
Puerto Deseado in the
Santa Cruz province; from here they travel to the outskirts of a remote local ranch where they then spend time filming penguins. After this, they then move north to
Peninsula Valdes where they spend several weeks filming a
South American fur seal colony as well as
southern elephant seals. Other animals observed on the peninsula include
guanacos. In the second part, his wife Jacquie having fallen ill and returned to
England, Durrell travels alone to the tropical province of Jujuy where he stays on a ranch with a couple, making friends with other locals who help him with his collecting work. He collects animals by purchasing pets from locals in the town he is based near initially, including a
red-fronted Tucuman amazon named Blanco,
yellow-fronted amazon parrots,
grey-necked guans an
armadillo and a
Geoffroy's cat kitten. Later travels to a larger nearby town yield up, amongst other things an
ocelot and a
yellow naped macaw. Durrell gets the chance to travel into some nearby forested mountains for three days before returning to Buenos Aires with his collection; during this period he fails to capture some
vampire bats, even though he offers his own toes as bait, but he succeeds in procuring a pygmy owl. The book ends as he leaves his friends and Argentina with his collection of animals to return to the
Channel Islands via ship. ==Critical reception==