La Costa - Lalo Loor Bosque Seco Reserve

Monday February 1 called for another early meeting, seven thirty at Estado Olimpico. It was all worth it though because by afternoon we knew we would be in walking distance of the Pacific Ocean. It was a somewhat less then comforting ride relative to how my head felt, and once we got up and over the Andes the humidity sure hit the roof. It was fine though because I was once again glad to be out of the dirty air of Quito.

It was a five hour drive to the coastal province of Manabi and you could tell immediately that life is different here. There are bananas, mantioc/yuca, and pineapple fields everywhere. Pants give way to shorts. Horses are more common, it is rainy, and the road is just being paved. there are also shrimp farm ponds, frigate birds and snakes.

We are staying at the visitors center at the Lalo Loor Dry Forest Reserve, Ceibas largest current ongoing conservation project. Lalo Loor is the land owner and is a dairy farmer who makes delicious yogurt. He came and talked to us about how his dad bought this land 57 years ago and how they always left a part of the forest relatively untouched. Now with Ceibas help he is enrolled in SocioBosque and gets money from the Ecuadorian government to pay for the ecosystem services his land provides. He also has created a reserve that allows visitors to learn about tropical conservation and to experience a small piece of the dry tropical forest that once covered the coastal region. In the meantime the reserve is also being built little by little in hopes that Western Ecuador can become an ecotourist destination centered on community based conservation. It is a lofty goal, but Lalo is a great example of a conservationist with a dual way of making a living. I think that it is having options that will allow conservation to flourish in the areas of the world that we need it most, because for one tourism is a somewhat fickle industry and second, it is nearly impossible to convince people who have constant worry about how to feed their family that they should dedicate time, space and energy to conservation.

Thus far I have been learning a ton here in general. Catherine and Joe are pretty amazing professors with a seemingly endless knowledge of the tropics. They both seem to be experts in multiple fields and I only hope that someday I can be half the scientist they are as individuals. In our last few days we have gone on a hikes, done vegetation samples in the pouring rain, had several lectures on plants and animals of the dry tropical forest and have been having a great time. Typed words cannot really serve our time here justice. With no electricity our evenings have been filled with either card games, group story exchanges or reading. Not a bad way to spend the semester.