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The cloud forests in the Andes of Ecuador are among the most species-diverse landscapes on Earth. However, these lush forests are under threat as they have to give way to fields and cow pastures.
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AnimalsTranscript
00:11She's rich because something extraordinary is happening here.
00:24These natural habitats remain intact only because humans use and shape them.
00:32A new pact with nature.
00:50Where sky, mountains, clouds and forest become one, life flourishes.
01:05Ecuador's cloud forests are a paradise for birds, amphibians and mammals.
01:18But for centuries now, humans have been clearing the mountain forests of the Andes.
01:26They've had to give way to cattle pastures and roads.
01:39Ecuador's population is growing year by year and pushing nature further and further back.
01:51Inhabitants and conservationists are looking for a way to preserve the forest and at the
01:58same time to profit from it.
02:04Is it possible to save the last of the cloud forests?
02:35There's water here in abundance.
02:43The western side of the Andes in Ecuador is one of the world's rainiest regions.
02:51It's an extreme climate to which the flora and fauna have adapted.
03:06Hundreds of tree varieties compete for space on the steep slopes.
03:15On their trunks and branches, they bear hanging gardens, promeliads and other plants that draw
03:22water and nutrients from the air.
03:30The plant world is a feast laid out for countless animals.
03:35Capuchin monkeys tuck into leaves and fruit.
03:43And bizarre predators make rich pickings.
03:54Whether centipedes, frogs or birds.
04:03Hardly any habitat feeds such a variety of species as the primeval forests of the Andes.
04:10There's many a small paradise, usually enveloped in mist.
04:19The rain clouds which move in from the Pacific Ocean get caught in the mountains, as around the town of
04:27Mindo.
04:29The hills here are still green and full of trees.
04:33In Ecuador, that's the exception.
04:35So why is there still so much intact cloud forest around Mindo?
04:44Mindo's natural world attracts a very special species.
04:52Tourists looking for jungle adventures.
04:55The local inhabitants have grasped this as an opportunity.
05:11Henry Patino is a small scale entrepreneur.
05:14He owns a simple lodging house in the town.
05:19He offers his guests a very special thrill.
05:31Riding the rapids on the river Mindo.
05:42It's not only Henry Patino who benefits from the tourists, but his crew as well.
05:48Youngsters from the village earn themselves a little when they accompany the visitors safely down the river.
06:09This mixture of nature and action goes down well with a lot of younger tourists.
06:14Mindo long since stopped being a sleepy Andean village.
06:28Year in, year out, this place attracts over 50,000 tourists from Ecuador and the rest of the world.
06:36In recent years, it's grown from a village into a small town.
06:56Mindo's mariposario, the butterfly garden, offers close-up encounters with marvellous creatures.
07:02The staff here breed 25 varieties of butterfly, including the most colourful and shimmering species of this region.
07:11From caterpillar to butterfly, tourists can experience the fluttering diversity of the tropical beauties.
07:28Mindo has learned to turn tropical nature into a lucrative business model.
07:37In this community, 90% of the people live from tourism.
07:42Directly or indirectly, it's an important economic factor.
07:48Shops, restaurants, hotels and the nature guides, it's all very positive for us.
07:56Many tourists come here above all for our world-famous Mindo Nambillo Forest Reserve.
08:05This community has been protecting its cloud forest on its own initiative for over 30 years and making a good
08:13living from it.
08:14That makes Mindo a trailblazer in Ecuador.
08:18The great variety of plant life attracts flying gemstones.
08:24Hummingbirds are truly airborne acrobats.
08:28They hover like mini helicopters.
08:30They are the only birds who can even fly backwards.
08:42Hummingbirds are constantly on the lookout for flowers.
08:53That's where the birds tank up on their fuel, sweet nectar.
09:04There are over 20 varieties of hummingbird in Mindo alone.
09:08Altogether, over 400 species of bird live in the town's vicinity.
09:14A world record.
09:17Mindo's example shows that mankind and nature need not be in opposition to each other.
09:22Forest conservation benefits not only the hummingbirds and other animals, but the community's human population of over 2,000 as
09:32well.
09:41But what functions so well in Mindo is the exception.
09:46Elsewhere, things usually look different.
09:49Nearly everywhere in Ecuador, the forests are being cleared for agriculture.
09:53The trees have to make way for fields and pasture land.
09:58Over 90% of the cloud forests have already been destroyed in this way.
10:07The loss of the forests endangers thousands of animal and plant species.
10:15And the soil is getting washed away.
10:25Just 50 kilometers away from Mindo lies Toachi Valley.
10:30As nearly everywhere else in the Andes, agriculture is predominant here.
10:35And the few remaining forests are getting smaller and smaller.
10:47When the Italian Giovanni Honora first visited the valley over 30 years ago, this was all untouched forest full of
10:56animals.
10:57At the time, Honora was a professor of biology in Ecuador's capital, Quito.
11:02And he fell in love at first sight with Toachi Valley.
11:14It's a long time ago, back in 1980, that I came upon virtually intact jungle here.
11:20My paradise.
11:22One day, a friend came to visit, a beekeeper.
11:26He wanted to see the forest.
11:28So off we went and marvelled at the birds, the orchids and the butterflies.
11:35Then suddenly, we heard a chainsaw.
11:40Someone was felling trees.
11:45My friend asked, why are they cutting them down?
11:48The answer is, poor people fell the trees to survive, to make way for pastures for cattle.
11:55And what can be done about it?
11:57Nothing.
12:03But nevertheless, Honora was determined to do something.
12:07Apart from being a biologist, the Italian is also a Catholic churchman.
12:12As a monk and missionary, he keeps coming back to the region.
12:16He's fully aware that the people on the land need to make a living.
12:24Most of the people who live in the valley are farmers.
12:27Many of them see land on which trees are growing, with no cattle grazing, as worthless.
12:35Giovanni Honora wants to help them find a way out of the dilemma.
12:43Can agriculture and nature exist side-by-side in the Toachi Valley region?
13:11In the mountains, Giovanni is meeting his old friend, Cesar Tapia.
13:17Cesar is a farmer, like everybody else here.
13:21He's also Honora's chief ally in the region.
13:37At one time, Cesar also cut down more and more trees for more and more pasturage.
13:49But over the years, he's gradually become a kindred spirit for Giovanni Honora.
13:55Because he also harbored a love of nature, of the plants, and of the multiplicity of animals in the forests.
14:02He wasn't happy to see them all disappearing.
14:13The two friends made a pact.
14:15The missionary supported Cesar and his family and arranged for the education of his nine children.
14:22In return, Cesar promised to help Giovanni.
14:26Together, they wanted to save the forest, or what was left of it.
14:30But would it be possible to recruit other local farmers for their dream?
14:44Cesar opened doors for his friend to meet the people of the area.
14:49Today, they're visiting a small sugar factory.
14:52Most of the families here earn just a few hundred dollars a year from sugar, vegetables, and milk.
15:01Most just manage to scrape by.
15:05In the large vats, the farmers boil down the juice of the sugar cane.
15:09The result is the panela, brown cane sugar.
15:13But the work is hard and doesn't pay much.
15:16For most of the farmers, though, nature conservation seems like the distant notion of rich people in the city.
15:25But many farmers could certainly imagine doing a deal with Giovanni and selling him stretches of land which yield particularly
15:33low returns.
15:36Bits of land always remain unused.
15:40Especially on steep slopes, Giovanni Onore found remnants of the old cloud forests.
15:46He collected money among friends in Europe and bought parcels of land like this from the farmers.
15:57At the time, buying land was the only way.
16:01But it was a nightmare.
16:03I had to go to the surveyor's office, the lawyer, the notary.
16:08Finally, I bought the first bit.
16:10I was applauded and received further donations.
16:13And I bought more land.
16:15Again, I had the run around with the authorities.
16:18All the red tape and bureaucracy.
16:26And that's how it went on and on.
16:29The forest grew and grew.
16:31And in the end, I fell in love with it.
16:38Piece by piece, Giovanni Onore managed over decades to put together a private conservation area.
16:45More than 1,500 hectares of land for leafcutter ants and many other species.
16:52The biologist named his forest the Otonga Reserve after a giant earthworm that lives here.
16:58A foundation of the same name became the official owner of the reserve.
17:04Giovanni made César his administrator.
17:07Don César now oversees and protects this natural paradise.
17:11He plants trees on the purchased pasturage.
17:14He lays down paths, thereby opening up the forest for biologist Giovanni Onore.
17:24But Giovanni the missionary is not yet satisfied.
17:27He wants not only to save the forest, but also to change attitudes towards it.
17:33He wants to infect the locals with his love of nature.
17:41Snakes are not necessarily dangerous, because not every species is poisonous.
17:46But that's never interested many local inhabitants who just killed every snake that crossed their path.
18:01This one is not poisonous. It's completely harmless. You can't even really bite. Its teeth are tiny.
18:12But he didn't just want people to look after snakes, but to stop hunting in the protected forest.
18:22That wasn't easy for me. The people were used to hunting wild boar, birds and armadillos. And now they were
18:33expected to give it up.
18:35You are a nasty person, they told me.
18:39It wasn't nastiness, but love of nature that motivated César and Giovanni.
18:44But that didn't really convince the locals. Many of them couldn't see what use the reserve was to them.
18:52However fascinated the two were by the remarkable way in which many species had adapted to the rainforest, they had
18:59to think up a new plan for the locals.
19:02The conservation project had to be good, not only for the wildlife, but for the people in the Toachi Valley
19:08as well.
19:18The cloud forest had to produce benefits for its neighbors. That became increasingly clear. Preferably work and an income.
19:27If that didn't happen, the project had no future.
19:35You can buy anything with money. That's easy. But changing people's hearts is the hardest thing of all.
19:49Whether Giovanni the monk was to prove successful depended less on help from heaven above than on people seeing sense
19:57in nature protection throughout the country.
20:02His reserve is about two hours by car from the capital, Quito.
20:14Here too, where now the world's highest-lying capital is expanding, used to be dense cloud forest.
20:22It's hard to believe that this was once a wild, natural landscape where large predators used to hunt.
20:30But this is still the case right on Quito's doorstep.
20:35Just 30 kilometers away, along a narrow path at an altitude of 2,800 meters, lies the small village of
20:44Yunguilla.
20:49Today, the villagers are holding a crisis meeting.
20:54Ecologist Santiago Molina has come from Quito because there's a problem with an animal inhabitant of the district.
21:01A predator, totally unexpected so close to a major city, is causing upset in Yunguilla.
21:12The men show Santiago Molina a shaky cell phone video.
21:19A large Andes bear is surprised in the process of killing a cow.
21:32An unpleasant surprise for Santiago Molina, because the predator is an old acquaintance, a bear called Yumbo.
21:45Yumbo is a bear that was found close by, abandoned by his mother.
21:51It was obvious that if we didn't rescue him, he would die.
21:56He was in a bad way, with fly eggs under his skin, which showed that his mother had left him
22:02some days earlier.
22:03So we decided to rescue him, in order to release him again later on here in Yunguilla.
22:21He stayed in a nursery for two years.
22:25And in 2015, we took him back to the place where we found him.
22:31He's the first bear to be successfully released back into the world in Ecuador.
22:39Yumbo's return to Yunguilla was a major event locally.
22:42It took a lot of manpower to lift the by then fully grown bear into a large wooden crate.
22:48Yumbo's last stage in captivity.
23:00But how would the other bears in the area react to Yumbo's return?
23:13In this case, the other bears accepted him, because he was family.
23:21Oh, I know you.
23:24So, for two years, everything went well.
23:27Yumbo survived, together with the other bears.
23:31But then, four months ago, he found a dead cow nearby.
23:41Cows sometimes stumble in the steep meadows.
23:45Some fall and are so badly injured that they die.
23:48The cadaver is then an easy target for bears like Yumbo.
23:52Once they have a taste for the meat, some move on to attack living cows.
24:07Understandably, that doesn't please the Yunguilla farmers.
24:12But in the meantime, the villagers have come to see that they, too, can profit from the bears.
24:24Bears can also offer prospects for tourism.
24:27Visitors can see the animals here, living in their natural environment.
24:37To go bear-watching, people need to know how many bears there are, and where they are most likely to
24:44be found.
24:45So, again and again, Molina joins guides from Yunguilla on short expeditions.
25:06But it's not easy to locate bears in the wild.
25:22The search takes Molina and his guide Edison deeper and deeper into the forest.
25:42But today, they don't see any.
25:45The track isn't wasted, though.
25:55Modern technology comes to the rescue.
26:00Molina and Edison have laid automatic photo and film traps everywhere.
26:06They're triggered by the smallest movement.
26:19And capture whatever's in front of the lens.
26:25There are a lot of deer around Yunguilla.
26:31And even pumas.
26:37Again and again, the cameras capture Andes bears, as well.
26:44Because of their distinctive marking, they're also known as spectacled bears.
26:55Even if some don't have spectacles at all.
27:00Small, predatory cats also appear in front of the camera.
27:05Oscillots.
27:16And time after time, pumas.
27:20It was a surprise for the biologists just how many large predators go hunting so close to humans.
27:31The conservationists attract the animals to their camera traps with a vanilla scent.
27:37Some bears love the perfume so much that they can't get enough of the bait.
27:41The biologists were able to identify over 60 bears.
27:50For us scientists, and also for the people of Yunguilla, it's good to know that we have bears here.
27:56It's an attraction that helps people get to know the area and the forest.
28:03If they're very lucky, they see a bear.
28:06If not, they can see one from the camera traps.
28:10The spectacled bear is the only bear in South America.
28:15Everybody would be happy to see an Andes bear.
28:18Or at least to be there, where the bears live.
28:27The bears and the beauties of nature have already changed life in Yunguilla.
28:32The locals rent rooms to tourists and would like to see a lot more visitors.
28:38But things have to develop at a gentle pace and benefit as many villagers as possible.
28:45This vegetable garden, for example, is part of the sustainable tourism concept of the village.
28:57Carrots and other vegetables are processed on the spot.
29:02In the new restaurant that all the villagers have built together.
29:10The number of tourists coming to Yunguilla is still manageable.
29:20Most are on day trips from Quito.
29:23Around 5,000 visitors a year are already providing the people of Yunguilla with a bigger income than farming.
29:38Young women from the community use the milk from the cows to make Queso de Yunguilla.
29:44The village's own cheese dairy is a thriving business, because the tourists now also buy the local products.
30:05The locals keep coming up with new ideas.
30:08Some of the women process mini papayas and other fruit into jam.
30:20A popular souvenir made in Yunguilla.
30:36All of us in the community feel pride.
30:39When someone asks, where are you from?
30:42We reply, I live in Yunguilla, where we conduct village tourism, where we protect nature and where we improve people's
30:50quality of life.
30:52That's why I believe everyone who lives here in Yunguilla and works on the project is very proud of what
30:58we're doing here.
31:03The initial successes of sustainable tourism are enabling Yunguilla to become ever more involved in conservation.
31:12Hardly anyone is still felling trees.
31:15Rather, Yunguilla is reforesting the forest.
31:18The seedlings for this are grown in the village tree nursery.
31:23Santiago Molina is happy to get hands-on when plants are involved.
31:32It's the community that's important for most of the locals, so there's never a shortage of helping hands.
31:48The long-term plan is to turn the pastures where the cows still graze today back into a cloud forest.
31:56Biologists used to think it was impossible to bring the forest back, but it can be done if people lend
32:03a hand.
32:04But it's not enough simply to wait for the trees to spread themselves.
32:08The first trees have to be painstakingly planted out.
32:19It's exclusively indigenous species that get this start-up support.
32:24When they're bigger, other seeds brought in by birds and bats can germinate in their shadow.
32:34For that to happen on this meadow will take a few years yet.
32:49In the last 20 years, Yunguilla has reforested 3,000 hectares of land.
33:03What looks like virgin jungle is in fact recreated forest.
33:08Not yet as species-rich as a primal cloud forest.
33:12But already, pumas and bears are hunting here again.
33:21Santiago Molina is pleased with developments to date.
33:25His dream is that other communities will follow Yunguilla's example,
33:29so that isolated areas of forest will grow together again into a large-scale habitat for the bears.
33:41This would guarantee the long-term survival of the small bear population living so close to the major city of
33:48Quito.
33:55When the fruits of a species of wild avocado ripen, it's the best time for biologists and tourists to observe
34:04Andes bears in the wild.
34:06They climb the trees to get to the small avocados.
34:14Sometimes a branch has to make way.
34:22And then the feast is there for the taking.
34:39Santiago Molina and the village of Yunguilla have already done a lot towards protecting the Andes bears.
34:45But there are other animals which people can't help on their own.
35:00In Quito, Ecuador's capital, specialists are using modern methods in a bid to save a whole group of animals threatened
35:08with gradual extinction.
35:15Morely Reed from Britain is an expert on lizards, snakes, newts and frogs.
35:21He's returning today from an expedition to remote cloud forests.
35:25He'll be presenting his findings to the director of the Rambatu Frog Research Center.
35:44Ecuador is a paradise for amphibians.
35:48Nowhere else is home to as many different species.
35:51But this diversity is under threat.
35:54Leaf by leaf, walking very slowly up the river.
35:59And we've spent two more nights looking for athelopes, but we didn't know.
36:01Luis Coloma founded the Jambatu Center because many species of frog are facing extinction.
36:09Mysterious fungal diseases are decimating countless amphibian species worldwide.
36:15Sadly, in Ecuador's forests too.
36:18The animals are dying even in places where their habitat still seems fully intact.
36:25We managed to get a number of really interesting ones after we collected it.
36:31So that night we arrived at about one in the morning.
36:35Coloma wants to research the causes of the frog deaths and save the endangered species of amphibian.
36:43Some frogs have become so rare that biologists have to spend a long time looking for the last of their
36:50species.
36:52We have built an intensive care unit for frogs.
37:01In the laboratory we're trying to breed and rescue varieties facing extinction.
37:06We'll then return them to the wild once we've understood the factors that are threatening them.
37:13We'll then return them to the wild ones.
37:15We'll return them to the wild ones.
37:17We'll return them to the wild ones.
37:18With his research center, Luis Coloma has created a Noah's Ark for some of the rarest and most beautiful of
37:27Ecuador's frogs.
37:32But researching and rescuing amphibians costs money and in Ecuador there's hardly any public research funding.
37:41To become independent of government funds, Coloma set up the Vicarie Company.
37:46Its business concept is new and not without controversy.
37:52The company and the research center share not only the same premises but also the same know-how.
37:58They breed frogs.
38:00The difference is that Vicarie sells the amphibians to enthusiasts all over the world.
38:06That's legal as long as the animals are born here in the laboratory.
38:14Equipped with official certificates, the frogs are air freighted to their new owners.
38:19This is also intended to undermine international trafficking by smugglers.
38:28These people come to Ecuador and pay locals a pittance to collect frogs.
38:34Then they smuggle the animals in their luggage to supply the international market.
38:42This further decimates the populations and not a penny stays in Ecuador.
38:48All the money flows to Europe and other markets abroad.
38:57So the firm is dealing in frogs in order to protect frogs.
39:03This works because affluent frog fans pay up to 600 euros for rare amphibians.
39:11It can take years to breed a species successfully.
39:14That makes the animals relatively expensive.
39:24But a share of the profits finances Luis Coloma's research center.
39:30Another part is used to buy and conserve forest areas in Ecuador that are especially in need of protection.
39:46The trade in frogs also supports the work of biologist and monk Giovanni Honora.
40:00Giovanni Honora is still looking for ways to protect his Otonga reserve long term.
40:07But the people of the region also need to profit from his cloud forest.
40:11So Giovanni is counting on paying guests.
40:16Helped by Italo, the son of his administrator César, he's building a small guest house.
40:23Giovanni employs only local workers.
40:30He has a very special clientele in mind for his guest house.
40:34He hopes to let the 30 rooms to students and scientists from home and abroad.
40:42their field of research would then be directly on the hotel's doorstep.
40:52The hotel and its guests will yield enough to safeguard the forest.
40:57We need a watchman, someone to keep the paths open, someone to make sure the trees aren't felled, someone to
41:04receive the guests.
41:05That creates jobs and at the same time produces a profit to conserve the jungle.
41:22Even before the last finishing touches are made on Honora's jungle hotel, the first guest registers.
41:30An old acquaintance.
41:35Morley Reed of the Khambatu Frog Centre is visiting the reserve on one of his expeditions.
41:51Morley is looking for a species of frog that used to be common in this area, but today is increasingly
41:57rare.
42:16The best chances of encountering this very special animal are along small streams where it's very wet.
42:27The scientist always carries a recording device to capture the typical croaking of all the different frogs.
42:34A song which the biologist doesn't recognise would indicate a new species still undescribed.
42:41Until it's dark and the objects of study become active, a small group of researchers presses on into the forest.
42:51On the way, the three of them make further discoveries.
42:56Morley has already noted over 200 species of snake.
43:00In the whole of Europe, there are just 50 species.
43:14Morley is fascinated by the emerald green Anolis lizards, which hunt on leaves.
43:24How angry it is.
43:36The lizard is bagged for closer examination later.
44:04As darkness falls, the frog concert begins.
44:09Morley is keyed up about finding what he's looking for.
44:20The biologists push ever further into the undergrowth.
44:28Now, oh look, here's a snake.
44:31Let's see if I can catch it.
44:35Still not the frog Morley's after, but then, success.
44:44Boana Picturata sitting on this leaf.
44:47Boana Picturata, the gold nugget tree frog, is a real beauty with huge eyes, an adaptation
44:55to life at night.
45:02Well, I'm hoping we might hear some calling tonight, but so far we haven't had any luck.
45:07It's a male or female?
45:08That is, most probably it's a male, and you can see it's a very nice golden yellow colour.
45:15Oh, with your big eyes.
45:16Yeah.
45:20Morley isn't able to record the croaking of the gold nugget tree frog on this occasion,
45:25but his hunt for frog calls is still successful.
45:35I think it, I think it was just over there.
45:51Yes, it's recording now.
45:54Yes, it's recording now.
46:08Male frogs croak in order to attract females willing to mate.
46:20Frog researchers like Morley Reid, though, are interested in the croaking for other reasons.
46:30The more songs that are known, the easier nature conservation becomes in the dense jungle.
46:37If a particular frog song is heard less and less, it's a warning that the species is endangered.
46:55At worst, like so many others, it can die out altogether.
47:12Giovanni Honora uses the knight for his own scientific research.
47:17His speciality is insects.
47:19With a bright light and a white sheet, he can attract moths.
47:26Look at the cyclocephalas.
47:28Look, one here, one here, one there.
47:31He has eyes.
47:33Ah, look.
47:39No other animal group in the cloud forest has as many species as insects.
47:46There are an estimated 60,000 different butterflies and moths here.
47:53There are as many varieties of butterflies and moths in the cloud forest as there are of vegetation.
47:59Most of them are dependent on just a few plants.
48:15A healthy cloud forest, though, doesn't benefit just the insects, but the humans living nearby as well.
48:22The trees capture the water out of the clouds and purify it.
48:32Clean water has long been taken for granted in rainy Ecuador.
48:37But intact rainforests are crucial as a natural supplier of pure drinking water.
48:52Nature has its own values.
48:56More and more people are understanding that.
49:01Politicians come from the town in the region looking for water here for their inhabitants.
49:07And the doctors say the clean water means fewer gastrointestinal diseases.
49:15There's a direct link between humans and nature conservation.
49:22I've got a photo of it.
49:23We found...
49:24Where did we find...
49:25Morley Reed and Giovanni Honora use the following morning to analyze what they caught in the night.
49:32Still, that's what I know.
49:34This will run.
49:35Yeah.
49:36In the very first bag, a rarity.
49:42In Ecuador's rainforests, there are snakes with a very special diet.
49:48Snails are on the menu of this slender beauty.
49:50Using their small pointed teeth, they pull the prey from their shells.
49:56Touch.
49:57I'm trying to get their head side onto the...
49:59More and more varieties of snake are being discovered in Ecuador.
50:03Almost every one of Morley Reed's expeditions comes back with something new.
50:08With the eula.
50:10Yeah.
50:11Beautiful, colourful...
50:12Yeah, yeah.
50:13Where to land.
50:15Frogs, snakes, insects.
50:18In the cloud forests of the Andes, biologists still have a lot to discover.
50:24For Giovanni Honora, that's the greatest value of the forest.
50:29And the strongest argument for preserving his paradise.
50:34That's why I invite researchers.
50:37When they find something new, they name it autongico or autongensis, after the reserve.
50:43It's a clear message.
50:45Don't touch.
50:46Here is biodiversity.
50:48What laws and politicians fail to do, scientists achieve.
50:54Giovanni Honora is confident that his approach will work.
50:59People and nature can benefit from each other.
51:03If used carefully, the magnificent cloud forests are not lost.
51:09Instead, they even grow back.
51:18In solo.
51:41This is not the last garden.
51:41This is smaller.
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