CICRA intern Sarah Federman relates her experience working at the Los Amigos Biological Station.

Sordid little detail: bugs (although I prefer the Spanish term, bichos – the sound of the word describes more fully my feelings than the hard ending of “bug”) have made off with the rubber parts of my earphones. I am not pleased. However, this is a price I am more than willing to pay to live and work at the Amazon Conservation Association’s Los Amigos Biological Station (known as “CICRA” in Spanish).

I wish I could package the sounds here – trills, screeches, squawks, growls, chirps, clicks, the mechanical hum of cicadas, and the steady patter of the swarm of wasps which flies repeatedly into the metal screens behind me. A flock of birds lives outside the dining hall. When they call, it is like listening to drops of water falling into a metal bowl.

To reach CICRA you must travel up the Madre de Dios river in a motorized canoe for anywhere between five and eight hours. The ride is amazing, opening up a scene of conflicting ideals. The wide river stretches sinuously below an imposing and mysterious wall of shining greens and browns reaching into the glaringly blue sky (or, as the rainy season sets in, the slate grey of an impending downpour); here it is easy to imagine nature as Nature. Below the wall of green, the water is littered with piles of discarded rocks upon which crouch men, women, and children. They sift and add to their ever-growing islands of refuse, which, with time, become archipelagoes of unrealized aspirations. At moments, though, hidden within the chaff is a whisper of gold that glints with the promise of paradise.

It would be easy to condemn one of these “ideals,” especially when presented with a literal divide at one point during the ride: a conservation concession beyond the bank of the river, with mining on the water. I wonder, though, if there is something more, some entanglement of these two seemingly irreconcilable experiences of the environment. It is this itching question, regarding the contents of the space of friction between two traditionally opposed realities which drives me to study not just ecology, but take a more interdisciplinary route of study.

One of the best perks of the job is that I get to organize and teach sábados científicos (Science Saturdays) at the closest town along the river. I was able to coordinate with the town’s teacher to create a year’s worth of lesson plans to complement the students’ scientific curriculum. The children are quite young, so sábado científico classes have a strong emphasis on combining group work, play, and knowledge of local biodiversity and ecosystems with the aim of promoting a sense of communal pride and protectiveness over local flora and fauna. Students often work in teams to solve questions, find and identify useful plants, or act out parts of an ecosystem; in this way we create a positive association between learning, play, and the amazing natural world in which we live.

ACA provides me with the perfect outlet for continuing and improving my passion for ecological investigations. I am allowed time to work with visiting researchers, allowing me to gain valuable field experience and skills, and to design and implement my own research projects. Thus far, I have designed two which I find quite interesting. The first is to monitor butterfly diversity with standard baited traps on an altitudinal gradient between ACA’s cloud forest station (Wayqecha) and CICRA, focusing on fruit feeding Nymphalidae butterflies as indicators of overall butterfly diversity. This investigation is primarily a “teaching study” maintained by students and volunteers with the intent to create opportunities to gain experience and learn field skills in the tropics. The second project is more of an independent investigation which compares vegetative regeneration in pristine and human-altered sites.

Thus far my work at CICRA has greatly expanded my array of field skills. I am confident that these important skills will further my goal to implement meaningful change as a professor or within a conservation organization, researching and educating on the subjects of ecology and conservation.

(Photos by Rick Stanley and Gabby Salazar)

Back in February 2010, the government of Peru issued an emergency decree to impose stricter environmental regulations on gold mining. The decree put a hold on approval of new mining claims in Madre de Dios, added controls over where mining is permitted, and prohibited river dredging. The Mining Federation of Madre de Dios (FEDEMIN), afraid the new regulations would cause informal miners to lose their livelihood, called for a strike beginning on April 4. Before the resolution of the four-day strike, violence broke out at a roadblock in northern Peru, resulting in six deaths. (Photo by Walter Wust)

Illegal mining has increased dramatically in recent years with the rising price of gold. Much of the gold market is informal, and thus the government has no way to enforce a tax on gold sales (nor labor and environmental regulations). In defense of the decree, Peruvian president Alan Garcia stated, “How can we permit a savage type of mining that doesn’t pay taxes, doesn’t pay proper wages and doesn’t use modern equipment … and which continues to contaminate the Amazon?”

The environmental impacts of gold mining are extensive. Small-scale miners use mercury to extract gold from river sediments. Through this process, large amounts of mercury run into the rivers – polluting fish which are a major protein source in the Amazon – and are absorbed by the soil. Once extracted, the amalgam is burned, releasing the mercury into the air and leaving behind pure gold and a high level of air pollution. In addition to mercury pollution, mining damages riverbanks, contributes to deforestation and, in the case of dredging, destroys riverbeds and silts in the waterways. Some illegal mining operations are carried out within protected-area buffer zones and concessions dedicated to ecotourism.

To resolve the four-day strike in April, an agreement was reached between the miners and the government. Peru’s Prime Minister, Ángel Javier Velázquez Quesquén, agreed to modify the decree to include mechanisms for its implementation. A commission was created by government and mining representatives to help formalize the miners within a reasonable timeframe, thus allowing illegal miners to become legal and to resolve the overlapping concessions.

Progress has been slow, partly due to arguments over representation on the commission and more recently due to the government’s unwillingness to take big steps right before an election. The regional election, however, has now passed and the news is that the pro-mining candidate was not elected. Over the last few months, community organizations have been working to find ways to prevent new mining invasions. Thus, while there have been setbacks in the process, we have also seen positive steps being taken.

Several civil society organizations in the region have been collectively active in supporting the Peruvian government’s efforts to increase environmental regulation. Taking a leading role, ACA provided a dossier of information on the impact of mining in Madre de Dios to Peru’s minister of the environment, Antonio Brack. This information included GIS studies of land use change, a report on mercury pollution in fish (funded by a grant from the ACA’s research grants program), and a collection of publications and photos of mining’s impact. In addition, ACA has supported an open dialogue between the environment ministry and regional and local stakeholders to examine the range of issues surrounding mining in Madre de Dios and to promote mining best practices. We support efforts to resolve these issues so that miners can continue to make a living while complying with regulations in their work as a way to protect the Amazon Basin and the health of the miners, their families, and their communities. (Photo above by Enrique Ortiz)

ACA’s hosting of NPR journalists in the summer of 2009 resulted in an award-winning multimedia package.

Reporter Lourdes Garcia-Navarro and photographer John Poole traveled along the Interoceanic highway in southern Peru with Adrian Forsyth and Enrique Ortiz, ACA’s president and vice-president, respectively. Joined by former secretary of the interior and ACA board member, Bruce Babbitt, the group visited some of the most impacted gold-mining areas, and witnessed firsthand the environmental destruction caused by the Interoceanic highway, a new road that will extend from the Atlantic Ocean in Brazil to the Pacific coast of Peru, threatening to create a band of deforestation that will cut the southwestern Amazon in two. The resulting multimedia piece has won an Award of Excellence from the White House News Photographers Association.

The group witnessed miles of deforestation, but they also visited one of the few glimpses of hope in the Amazon basin – ACA’s Los Amigos Biological Station. Here, they saw how the simple dedication of a few committed scientists preserve 360,000 acres of rainforest for research and future generations. To join the journey with the award-winning journalists, click on: Traveling Down the Amazon Road. To read more about the prestigious award from the White House News Photographers Association, see: White House News Photographers Association / Eyes of History. (Photos by John Poole)

 During field trips earlier this year to the community of Toromonas, in northwestern Bolivia, ACA-Bolivia team members came across four species that had never previously been registered in that location. These species include the lesser sac-winged bat (Saccopteryx leptura), and several birds: the black manakin (Xenopipo atronitens), Snethlage’s tody-tyrant (Hemitriccus minor), the brownish twistwing (Cnipodectes subbrunneus), Thamnophilus stictocephala, and Heterocercus linteatu.

ACA conducted these biological inventories as part of its work with the Takana indigenous communities who are the guardians of the remote and clearly understudied Pampas del Heath savannas just north of Madidi National Park. ACA staff have created monitoring protocols for hunting and fishing in order to develop management plans for local biodiversity conservation in these communities. By learning how to measure the impact of their own hunting and fishing activities and role of local wildlife, the community members are establishing sustainable hunting and fishing practices for the future. (Photos by Omar Martinez)

ACA’s Peruvian sister organization, the Asociación para la Conservación de la Cuenca Amazónica (ACCA), recently purchased 7,576 acres of land in southern Peru, thanks to funding from ACA, the American Bird Conservancy, the World Land Trust, and private donors. Located between the Piñi Piñi and Tono Rivers in the Manu Biosphere Reserve, the property is renowned for its incredibly diverse bird population. This acquisition and the creation of a private conservation area by ACCA will help to ensure the long-term protection of the region’s incredible diversity of wildlife. (Photo by Megan MacDowell)

The property, known as Villa Carmen, lies within the spectacular 4.7-million-acre Manu Biosphere Reserve, which is one of the most pristine areas of remaining rainforest in the Amazon. The land contains roughly 90 percent old-growth rainforest, with about five percent diversified agriculture and five percent secondary forest. Villa Carmen is particularly valued for its bird life, as it is home to more than 600 known species, including threatened species, like the military macaw, and migratory songbirds, like the Canada warbler.

ACA and ACCA will jointly oversee the management of Villa Carmen, where we will promote sustainable agroforestry and aquaculture, host educational programs, conduct research, and further incorporate local communities into conservation efforts. ACA is extremely excited about this new opportunity to protect a vital wildlife area, and we encourage you to check back for updates on Villa Carmen’s progress! (Photo by Adrian Tejedor)

Bats are among the least understood and most loathed mammals on the planet.  Myth and legend paint them as cruel vampires that would not hesitate to drink all the blood from their innocent victims.  While it is true that three blood-sucking species exist in the world, they are not as cruel as myths make them seem, and there are many other species that have important roles in their ecosystems. In rainforests in particular, bats control insect populations, serve as pollinators and seed dispersers for numerous plant species, and in some cases regulate populations of small vertebrates, providing balance to the intricate web of life in the forest.

Bolivia is one of the countries with the highest levels of biodiversity in the world, a fact which is evident in the number of mammal species that exist. This charismatic group of fauna includes 125 species of bat, which is close to half of the total mammal species in the country. Madidi National Park, a protected area of international importance and a jewel of biodiversity, spans numerous ecological zones, from permafrost to Amazonian forest, and is home to more than 90 bat species.

Bats are crucial for all the ecosystems they inhabit, yet we still know far too little about the species found in this region. We continue to identify new species in the Park, but information about their natural history and ecology is still very limited. Most of the species of bats in Madidi were recorded through a combination of sampling methods, including the use of mist nets at ground and canopy level complemented by acoustic monitoring. This mix of sampling methods provides a more complete view of the species present in a particular ecosystem. Even though ACA-Bolivia has made great progress in recording this region’s bat species, there are still many ecosystems and forest types to be sampled. Further study will certainly increase the known diversity of bats in this protected area and will make evident the great intrinsic and ecological value of these species while adding to our ability to conserve this magnificent landscape. (Photo above by Graham Anderson and illustration by Adrian Tejedor.)

REDD—Reducing Emissions from Deforestation & Forest Degradation—is a powerful new mechanism for mitigating climate change by compensating tropical countries for their reductions of greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation. ACA has designed a REDD project that will alleviate poverty through the creation of training and employment opportunities for local and indigenous communities in Cusco’s highlands and cloud forest zones. In June 2009, ACA received a nearly $500,000 grant from Norway’s international development agency (Norad) to fund the first year of the project.

Deforestation and forest fires are a major concern for the department of Cusco, where world-renowned Manu National Park has already lost over 44,000 acres to fires caused by humans. This enormous loss is in part due to about 4,000 head of cattle in the highland areas of the park, where cattle owners burn grasslands to provide young grasses for the cattle. Additionally, in the buffer zone around the park, many communities lack access to cooking fuel and electricity, and instead cut down their forests for firewood.

The heart of the project lies in helping these buffer communities to minimize the use of fire to clear pasture for their cattle and firewood and to create financial and market incentives for them to conserve native forests. A central initiative is to reforest degraded lands with green firebreaks that are enriched with profitable Andean plant species. Already, ACA has developed fire prevention workshops in partnership with Manu National Park and begun hosting them in local communities.

As part of this grant project, ACA will hold a REDD conference in Cusco on December 3 and 4, 2009. The conference will introduce the concept of REDD to regional government officials, indigenous representatives from the Queros Wachiperi community, and district leaders from the buffer zone of Manu National Park.

Other project activities include firefighting training with Manu National Park guards, construction of plant nurseries, design of pilot REDD projects with communities, and technical support for designing REDD policies in Peru. ACA is also conducting outreach in the United States to policymakers and development funders about the REDD approach in high-forest, low-deforestation countries, such as Peru and Bolivia.

Over the course of the next five years, ACA intends to demonstrate that helping communities build a portfolio of conservation-based industries and connecting them with international and local markets will reduce deforestation pressure on the Andean cloud forest. The project also includes a strong scientific component, extending research already underway on fire frequency, forest degradation, and greenhouse gas emissions in the Andes. These studies will provide communities with information they need to make good decisions about resource management.

The project is designed as a scalable REDD mechanism that is replicable in other tropical mountain regions and that incorporates strategies to strengthen REDD programs worldwide. Human-caused fire in the tropical Andes is emitting large amounts of CO₂, degrading ecosystems, destroying biodiversity, and threatening human livelihoods. Our project can reduce the frequency of fires at the same time it alleviates poverty and conserves healthy watersheds. If you’re interested in learning more, please see our fact sheet (PDF). ACA is currently seeking interested partners and donors for this project. (Photos above by Megan MacDowell and Carmen Giusti.)

ACA’s research station functioned as a world-class photo studio for Graham D. Anderson, a leading wildlife photographer, who served as resident artist at the Los Amigos Biological Station during August and September 2009. Graham’s work in Los Amigos has been focused on taking pictures of birds and bats in flight. Through the use of infrared lights as sensors and other electronic elements that he developed, he has been able to capture stunning motion shots.

“I never expected it to be so easy to take nature photos the way I have been able to in Los Amigos,” Graham said. “Not just because of the facilities, but because there are animals everywhere, not to mention you are constantly in contact with researchers who provide you with a wealth of information.

“My experience at Los Amigos was fabulous. I am looking forward to my travels to Wayqecha Cloud Forest Research Center near Cusco, where ACA has another station that is dedicated to their vision of preserving the Amazon in a way that evokes a sense of social responsibility. I want to experience it and take pictures of flying hummingbirds—I know there are plenty there.”

ACA takes great pride in the fact that photographers of Graham’s caliber consider the concession to be a natural studio for photography and filming. ACA works hard to make this “studio” accessible to professional and amateur photographers and filmmakers around the world, who work alongside the biologists and other researchers at the station.

“We don’t want to just show the scientific side of the picture. This of course helps researchers answer many questions in terms of biodiversity, but what we really want to highlight are the immense opportunities for outreach available in the ACA’s biological facilities and conservation concessions,” said ACCA science manager Adrian Tejedor. (Photos by Graham Anderson.)

The Peruvian Minister of Environment, Dr. Antonio Brack Egg, attended the 8th annual MAP Forum, a tri-national civil society conference on sustainable development named for the areas it includes: Madre de Dios, Peru; Acre, Brazil; and Pando, Bolivia.

Minister Brack’s presence at the conference in Puerto Maldonado, Peru demonstrated the interest that the new Environment Ministry has in conservation in the Amazon’s headwaters. It also raised the profile of the forum, which began as a small volunteer-run meeting eight years ago; ACA has participated in the forum for a number of years.

In his speech, Minister Brack lauded MAP participants for their efforts and pointed to other opportunities for sustainable development in the southwestern Amazon such as ecotourism, fish farming, reforestation, and carbon markets. He also made special mention of the potential for tropical research, and identified ACA’s Los Amigos Biological Station as a role model for the region and a first-class research facility where many plants and animal species have been discovered. (Photo by Miguel Moran.)