“And this big one?” Ancelmo Dugarte asks his 3-year-old son, Marco Antonio, pointing to a towering pine in front of them. “Pino laso,” the little voice replies. “And this one? What’s this called?” Dugarte asks again, now touching the leaf of a plant. “Laurel baboso,” Marco Antonio answers. His father repeats it once more, as part of his mission to teach his son all the dozens of native plant species close to his home.

This conversation between Dugarte and his son took place in 2019 amid the cloud forest of El Tambor, located in the Sierra de La Culata National Park, in Mérida, Venezuela. They live in San Eusebio, a town close to the cloud forest, where Dugarte volunteers with the El Tambor Project, created in 2018 in order to help restore the forest with native plants with community participation.

Over the past four years, El Tambor Project has successfully produced more than 15,000 plants belonging to nearly 50 native tree species, primarily from families such as Myrtaceae, Lauraceae, Podocarpaceae and Melastomataceae. This project seeks to restore approximately 22,000 hectares (54,300 acres) of cloud forest. A biodiversity hotspot, this area hosts more than 200 species of birds, 50 species of mammals, 153 species of orchids and 150 species of bromeliads.

Since 2012, Ana Quevedo and Mauricio Jerez, both forest engineers and professors at the University of the Andes, began work to restore and conserve the forest using mixed forest plantations with native species at the university’s San Eusebio Experimental Forest Station.

In 2018, the two created El Tambor Project, aiming to expand restoration efforts in the cloud forest, which has been extensively degraded by logging and dairy farming, among other factors. According to the Red Book of Venezuelan Terrestrial Ecosystems, the Mérida cloud forests are classified as in “critical risk of collapse.”

According to Zoilo Ferrer, a forest engineer who is not part of the project, between 2003 and 2009, forest cover in Andrés Bello municipality, where El Tambor is, decreased from 23,300 hectares (57,575 acres) to 19,650 hectares (48,556 acres), approximately 611 hectares (1,510 acres) per year, corresponding to an average net forest loss rate of 2.61% per year — a high deforestation rate.

To reproduce native and endemic plants in the area, the project used assisted natural regeneration techniques, a blend of active planting and passive restoration, which helps trees and native vegetation recover naturally, leveraging local knowledge to eliminate barriers and threats to their growth. Local community members, including farm owners, farmers, housewives, children and teenagers, have been part in this effort.

While developing the project, the team has identified at least 42 threatened species of flora and fauna in the area, listed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List, with statuses ranging from vulnerable to critically endangered. Threats to species include illegal hunting, uncontrolled burning, indiscriminate logging due to domestic gas shortages, deforestation, inappropriate land use practices and climate change impacts, according to research by El Tambor Project.

Among the plant species present, 22 are listed in Venezuela’s Red Book of Flora as either vulnerable, of least concern or endangered. Pino laso (Retrophyllum rospigliosii), the native tree Marco Antonio recognizes from a very young age, is among the endangered species.

Using native plants to conserve and restore the cloud forest

The work carried out by  seven core members of El Tambor Project and more than 15 collaborators — scientists and researchers from the Center for Research on Integrated Risk Management at the University of the Andes, as well as technicians, mountain guides and volunteers — aims primarily to preserve and restore cloud forest ecosystems through conservation, restoration and management actions. These include the planting of native tree species and the setting aside of lands for their conservation and recovery.

“The use of species for restoration has significantly increased as we gather information about their requirements. We’ve managed to establish species mixes adapted to local climatic conditions, thereby restoring the structure and functions of cloud forests,” Quevedo tells Mongabay.

Currently, the project operates two large permanent nurseries capable of producing 3,000 plants each. Additionally, temporary nurseries are set up on farms where restoration is underway to tackle degradation from logging and livestock farming. These nurseries are initiated by the farmers themselves, who reduced the amount of land used for agriculture to grow 300-500 plants that are then transplanted in designated areas of their farms.

“We have achieved a survival rate of more than 75% in the first three years. Some fast-growing tree species have reached more than 10 meters (33 feet) in height,” Quevedo says. In addition to trees, they have recently included in their restoration plans native shrubs and herbaceous plants, reflecting the complexity of habitats and the variety of degradation conditions and affected species.

José Rafael Lozada, a forest engineer with a PhD in plant biology not associated with El Tambor, tells Mongabay that reforestation with exotic plants was predominant in Venezuela during the second half of the 20th century. He emphasizes that it was political, and not environmental criteria, that drove the preference for reforestation with exotic fast-growing forest species.

“Politicians seek quick results, in four or five years, which is how long their administrations last. That is why exotic reforestation has been a priority because it has immediate results. It has to be seen in a satellite image. But it seems to me that those who carry out El Tambor Project are doing what should be done: They have managed to reproduce in nurseries plants that are in Venezuela’s Red Book of Flora, and that had not been done in Venezuela,” Lozada says.

To help with restoration efforts, the project team has also been cataloging local flora and fauna.

“Although there are species lists, some need to be accurately identified in the field. One such species is Weinmannia jahnii [a type of woody plant including trees, shrubs and lianas], an endangered endemic species that we haven’t been able to clearly differentiate from another similar species, which is necessary to undertake actions to protect the correct species,” Quevedo says.

Researchers also identified a new orchid species, whose description was published in 2022 (Epidendrum tamborense), alongside a dozen more species potentially new to science, which are currently being identified.

“Some of these discoveries have been rediscoveries of species that hadn’t been reported for over 100 years. The orchid catalog has expanded from about 110 species to nearly 200 from 2018. Regarding fauna, we have photographed over 160 bird species out of an estimated 300 for the area, as well as endangered amphibians that hadn’t been observed in several years, belonging to the genera Aromobates, Dendropsophus, Pristimantis and Bolitoglossa [salamander],” Quevedo says.

Reconnecting forest fragments to protect wildlife

Edgar Yerena, a biologist and expert in planning and management of natural protected areas, led the delimitation of Sierra de La Culata National Park in 1989, which includes the El Tambor cloud forest. Within its boundaries is an important extension of forest fragmented by human intervention, whose fragments are connected through a corridor that was also heavily deforested in the 1980s due to extensive cattle ranching.

Yerena also studies the importance of this biological corridor for the protection of the Andean bear (Tremarctos ornatus), whose population in Venezuela is decreasing due to habitat fragmentation and destruction by expanding farming and hunting.

“In my opinion, more attention should be paid to the prevention of deforestation. For the work done by El Tambor Project to have an impact on the protection of the Andean bear, my recommendation is that they determine where the connector between the two forest blocks is and focus their work there so that the passages are not lost, because currently the bears are jumping from forest island to forest island, and this constitutes a threat to them,” Yerena tells Mongabay.

Restoration calls for resources and sustainable environmental policies

Despite receiving funding from international and national organizations and volunteer work from the communities near the cloud forest, El Tambor remains short of resources.

The lack of budget experienced by universities and scientific research centers in Venezuela constitutes a limitation for the development of projects like El Tambor. The laboratories for studying the plants and soils of the cloud forest have outdated equipment, there are daily power outages of up to eight continuous hours throughout the state of Mérida, and the sale of gasoline (essential for traveling from the city to the work area in the cloud forest) is scarce.

“The project has received support from the National Fund for Science, Technology and Innovation [a government agency]. However, continued support is required to achieve the goals of restoring the forest landscape and to advance in research, teaching and extension. Due to the increase in prices for transportation, food, materials, etc., we have had to resort to the support of different organizations to maintain the level of operation and to scale up to other areas,” Quevedo explains.

El Tambor Project was recognized in 2023 by the Green Awards as one of the world’s top 500 socioenvironmental projects, specifically in habitat and ecosystem conservation. However, its sustainability and replication in other areas of the country depend on continued support and the development of long-lasting forest conservation policies that include environmental education and awareness as well as economic incentives for ranchers and farmers with farms in cloud forest areas.

“Community awareness-raising has not always achieved the expected level of participation. It is an activity that requires a lot of perseverance. In addition, most people find themselves in a difficult economic situation, where all their energies must be devoted to subsistence. However, we have learned that with persistence and fieldwork, the foundations are laid for the tangible demonstration of the medium- and long-term benefits of ecological restoration,” Quevedo says.

Ancelmo Dugarte and his son, Marco Antonio, are an example of the environmental awareness that El Tambor project is generating in the communities. In Marco Antonio’s school and three others closer to the cloud forest, El Tambor project has developed environmental education programs with children and adolescents. Dugarte and his family seem optimistic: “In a few years, only those of us who have forests will be able to have water. That is why we have to take care of it and conserve it,” he tells Mongabay.

Citations:

Quevedo-Rojas, A., & Jerez-Rico, M. (2021). Mixed forest plantations with native species for ecological restoration in cloud forests of the Venezuelan Andes. Silviculture. doi:10.5772/intechopen.95006

Visaez, F., & Greaves, E. D. (2019). Reforestation in Venezuela – current situation and future perspectives. REFORESTA, (8), 60-73. doi:10.21750/refor.8.04.74

Banner image: El Tambor is the name of a massif found in the San Eusebio cloud forest, located in the tropical Andes of western Venezuela. Image courtesy of El Tambor Project.

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