Greening a path for tapir´s return

Greening a path for tapir´s return 1

by Jack Ewing

You're driving south on the Coastal Highway and are thoroughly bored with oil palms as far as the eye can see. Rounding a curve, a wonderful new view opens up not far ahead, mountains covered with rainforest. Crossing a big bridge is where you enter the Path of the Tapir Biological Corridor. The forested mountain range, called the Coastal Ridge, is the central pathway of the corridor.

An observer with an aerial view could follow that ridge up north to the Savegre River, 15 km to the Los Santos Forest Reserve, and down the coastline 80 km to the Sierpe-Terraba mangroves, and the Osa Peninsula; thus, connecting those two large rainforests and a multitude of smaller nature reserves in between. There are tapirs at both ends of the corridor, and there used to be lots of them within its bounds. The area endured a severe deforestation from the early 40s to the mid 80s, and they all perished. The last was killed by a hunter in 1957.

Tapirs are big, beautiful, charismatic mammals, the largest in Central America. An adult will weigh about 275 kg (600 lb.). The prehensile snout or short trunk is used to grasp vegetation and pull it into its mouth. Known as the “Gardeners of the Rainforest”, tapirs clear small areas in the jungle leaving bare soil where a variety of plants can spring forth and cover the forest floor. Additionally they are great dispersers of seeds.

The dream of the Path of the Tapir is to restore enough natural habitat to deforested lands so that the tapir will return. Much secondary forest has already regenerated in former cattle pastures. Since the initiation of the project, in 1990, three monkey species, pumas, scarlet macaws, and several other species of birds that prefer forest to pasture have migrated along the corridor and repopulated areas where they have been absent for many years. A number of tapir sightings in recent years give hope that the goal is near. I firmly believe that I will live to see the day when tapirs once again set foot on Hacienda Barú.

CONTACT: Jack Ewing – Hacienda Barú – see ad opp. Page

 

DISCOVER MORE

Wildcard SSL Certificates