Four new species of tarantulas, including one new genus, have been described from India’s Western Ghats mountains.
A concerning trend shows that 25% of newly described tarantula species since 2000 have appeared in the pet trade, with some appearing for sale within months of being scientifically described.
Tarantulas face dual threats from illegal collection for the pet trade and habitat loss in the Western Ghats, where many are found only in small patches of remaining forest surrounded by tea plantations.
These spiders serve as important predators and indicators of healthy habitats in their ecosystems, but are particularly vulnerable due to their slow reproduction rates and the difficulty in detecting them during smuggling attempts.
A researcher described four new species of tarantulas, including one new genus, from India’s Western Ghats, a chain of mountains running along the country’s west coast.
“Most people in India are not even aware that there are tarantulas in India when there are more than 60 species in the country,” Zeeshan Mirza, from the Max Planck Institute for Biology in Germany, who found and described the species, told Mongabay.
The large, fuzzy spiders live in tree hollows, along streams and forest paths, and in forest patches. They exhibit interesting behaviors, such as females carrying their egg sacs under their mouth parts (or chelicerae) or creating hammock-like web structures to protect their eggs.
Zeeshan Mirza with one of the new tarantula species from the Western Ghats. Mirza has discovered several species of reptiles in India as well. Photo courtesy of Mirza.
One of the new species, named Haploclastus bratocolonus (meaning “tree dweller”), makes its home in hollow trees along rivers. Another species, Haploclastus montanus, was found living at elevations higher than 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) in mountain forests, making it one of the highest-living tarantulas known from the region. Some of the new species were found in the rare small fragments of remaining shola forest surrounded by tea plantations.
Among the species was an entirely new genus of tarantulas called Cilantica, named after the Tamil word for spider. They can be identified by the unique scattered pattern of curved bristles on their bodies, unlike the C-shaped arrangement of bristles found in other tarantulas.
Tarantulas serve important roles in their forest homes, acting as biological pest controllers and preying on smaller invertebrates and vertebrates. “They also form part of the diet of other species like spider wasps and small carnivores,” Mirza said. “They are keystone species and indicators of undisturbed habitats.”
A female Haploclastus montanus, a new species of tarantula found in the Western Ghats. Photo courtesy of Zeeshan Mirza The burrow of a newly described tarantula genus in the Western Ghats if India. Photo courtesy of Zeeshan Mirza.
However, there’s trouble for tarantulas across the globe. A recent study reveals that 25% of all newly described tarantula species since 2000 have ended up in the international pet trade, meaning many spiders could be at risk from collectors before we can fully understand them
Alice Hughes, a biologist at the University of Hong Kong who studies the global trade in arachnids, found that rare spiders often appear for sale shortly after being scientifically described. Her research revealed that an estimated 1,264 arachnid species are currently traded worldwide.
More than 73% of arachnid species sold online aren’t listed in international trade monitoring systems, according to Hughes’s research. “For most of these species we don’t have the data, but we’re also focusing so much on species like elephants, that we’ve forgotten that literally 99.9% of [arachnid] species are not getting the level of attention they deserve,” she said.
Cilantica agasthyaensis is one of the new species included in a new genus of trantulas from the Western Ghats. Photo courtesy of Zeeshan Mirza.
The problem is made worse because detecting a smuggled tarantula is difficult. “Tarantulas cannot be detected easily through X-ray-based screening at airports as they lack bones,” Mirza said.
He added the speed at which newly discovered species can end up in the pet trade is alarming. For example, the tarantula Haploclastus devamatha was described from the Indian state of Kerala in 2014, and within eight months was being “sold in several online pet stores,” he said. “Even now, many pet stores have this species on sale on their websites.”
Tarantulas are especially vulnerable to overcollection because they reproduce slowly and live a long time (10-20 years or more). Many species are found only in small areas, meaning too much collecting could wipe out entire populations.
“As a researcher, I am worried about the fate of the new species I described,” Mirza said.
Silent Valley National Park in India’s Western Ghats. Some of the mountain range is protected, but many areas face threats from development and hunting. Photo courtesy of Zeeshan Mirza.
The discovery of the new tarantula species underscores both the region’s biological richness and the ongoing need for conservation efforts. The Western Ghats, recognized as a biodiversity hotspot, harbor numerous endemic species found nowhere else on Earth. While parts of it are protected, the ecosystem faces threats from deforestation, agriculture and climate change. The paper suggests that these tarantulas could serve as flagship species for invertebrate conservation in the Western Ghats.
To protect these spiders, Mirza suggested several solutions. People living in areas with tarantulas can help by reporting illegal collection to forest departments. He also recommended better training for customs and airport security, possibly including sniffer dogs to detect smuggled spiders.
For tarantula enthusiasts, Mirza offered clear advice: “Tarantula enthusiasts can be more responsible and only choose species that have been captive-bred and are not sourced illegally.”
Banner image of Zeeshan Mirza, with one of the four new tarantula species he found in India’s Western Ghats.
Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay and holds a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Tulane University, where she studied the microbiomes of trees. View more of her reporting here.
Mirza ZA (2024) Systematics of the Western Ghats endemic tarantula subfamily Thrigmopoeinae with the description of a new genus and four new species. Travaux du Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle “Grigore Antipa” 67(2): 183-234. https://doi.org/10.3897/travaux.67.e112517
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Scientists described numerous new species this past year, the world’s smallest otter in India, a fanged hedgehog from Southeast Asia, tree-dwelling frogs in Madagascar, and a new family of African plants.
Experts estimate that fewer than 20% of Earth’s species have been documented by Western science, with potentially millions more awaiting discovery.
Although species may be new to science, many are already known to local and Indigenous peoples and have traditional names and uses.
Upon discovery, many new species are assessed as threatened with extinction, highlighting the urgent need for conservation efforts.
A giant anaconda, a vampire hedgehog, a dwarf squirrel, and a tiger cat were among the new species named by science in 2024. Found from the depths of the Pacific Ocean to the mountaintops of Southeast Asia, each new species shows us that even our well-known world contains unexplored chambers of life.
This year, in Peru’s Alto Mayo Landscape alone, scientists uncovered 27 new-to-science species, including four new mammals, during a two month expedition. Meanwhile, the Greater Mekong region yielded 234 new species, and scientists from the California Academy of Sciences described 138 new species globally. The ocean depths continued to surprise, with more than 100 potentially new species found on an unexplored underwater mountain off Chile’s coast. Two new mammal species were found in India this year, including the world’s smallest otter.
Scientists estimate only a small fraction of Earth’s species have been documented, perhaps 20% at best. Even among mammals, the best-known group of animals, scientists think we’ve only found 80% of species. Yet most of the hidden species are likely bats, rodents, shrews, moles and hedgehogs.
Members of Indigenous Awajun communities in Peru’s Alto Mayo assist scientists with their research, such as throwing cast nets to capture fish. 68 fish species were collected, including eight that are new to science. Photo courtesy of Conservation International/ Trond Larsen.
However, while species may be new to Western science, many have been well known to Indigenous peoples and local communities for generations. These communities often maintain sophisticated classification systems and deep ecological knowledge about species’ behaviors, uses and roles in local ecosystems.
“For example, the blob-headed fish, which is so bizarre and unusual, and scientists have never seen anything like it, but it’s very familiar to the Awajún,” Trond Larsen, the leader of the Alto Mayo expedition in Peru from the NGO Conservation International, told Mongabay. “They regularly catch and eat them.” Similarly, the ghost palm, newly named by scientists this year, has been used by Iban communities in Borneo for basketry and food for decades.
Unfortunately, many species may be threatened with extinction before they’re even formally named, victims of human activities like development and climate change. Some of these species could be foods or medicines for humans, but each has a unique role in Earth’s interconnected web of life.
“There is something immensely unethical and troubling about humans driving species extinct without ever even having appreciated their existence and given them consideration,” Walter Jetz, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Yale University, U.S., told Mongabay.
Here’s our look at some of the new-to-science species described in 2024:
The Greater Mekong region revealed some of the year’s most distinctive species. Local nature enthusiasts and researchers documented a hedgehog species with fang-like teeth, leading to its name vampire hedgehog (Hylomys macarong).
They also described a pit viper (Trimeresurus ciliaris) whose scales create the appearance of dramatic eyelashes, and a karst dragon lizard (Laodracon carsticola) first noticed by a local tour guide.
These findings illuminate the region’s rich biodiversity and conservation challenges, as many species face immediate threats from development and wildlife trafficking.
Northern green anaconda, a new species found in Ecuador, feeding on a large lizard. Photo by Jesus Rivas.
A significant discovery has been made in the Ecuadorian Amazon, where scientists have identified a new species of giant anaconda in the Bameno region of Baihuaeri Waorani Territory. During their research, the team encountered an impressive female specimen measuring 6.3 meters (20.7 feet) in length from head to tail, though local Indigenous communities report encountering even larger individuals. The species faces multiple threats throughout its range, from deforestation destroying their habitat to direct hunting by humans and environmental degradation from oil spills.
One of the newly named frogs, Guibemantis ambakoana. Ambakoana means ‘living within Pandanus’ in Malagasy. Image courtesy of Hugh Gabriel.
In Madagascar’s eastern rainforests, three frog species living in pandan trees received their first scientific descriptions. Known locally as sahona vakoa (pandan frogs), these amphibians complete their entire life cycle within the water-filled spaces between the plants’ spiky leaves. The species, now given the scientific names Guibemantis rianasoa, G. vakoa and G. ambakoana, exemplify how local ecological knowledge often precedes formal scientific documentation by generations.
A Chaunacops, a genus of bony fish in the sea toad family, seen at a depth of nearly 1,400 m (4,560 ft) on Seamount SF2 inside Nazca-Desventuradas Marine Park. Image courtesy of Schmidt Ocean Institute. CC BY-NC-SA A rarely seen Bathyphysa conifera, commonly known as flying spaghetti monster was documented on an unnamed and unexplored seamount along the Nazca Ridge off the coast of Chile. Image courtesy of ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).
An expedition in the Southeast Pacific discovered more than 100 potentially new-to-science species on a previously unknown underwater mountain, including deep-sea corals (order Scleractinia), glass sponges, sea urchins (class Echinoidea), amphipods (order Amphipoda) and squat lobsters (family Galatheidae).
The expedition also sighted rare creatures like the flying spaghetti monster (Bathyphysa conifera) and Casper octopus (genus Grimpoteuthis).
The seamount, rising about 3 kilometers (nearly 2 miles) from the seafloor, about 1,450 km (900 mi) off Chile’s coast, hosts thriving deep-sea ecosystems with ancient corals and glass sponges. The findings highlight the rich biodiversity of the high seas as the U.N. finalizes treaties to protect international waters.
A new-to-science frog species from Vietnam identified as the Mount Po Ma Lung toothed toad (Oreolalax adelphos). Image courtesy of Zoological Society of London.
Two new species of rare, toothed toads were discovered in Vietnam and China: the Mount Po Ma Lung toothed toad (Oreolalax adelphos) and the Yanyuan toothed toad (Oreolalax yanyuanensis). These amphibians are characterized by an unusual row of tiny teeth on the roof of their mouths. The discovery brings the total known toothed toad species to 21. However, more than half are already considered threatened due to habitat loss and degradation.
This ‘blob-headed’ fish (Chaetostoma sp.), is new to science and was a shocking discovery due to its enlarged blob-like head, a feature that the fish scientists have never seen before, even though this species is already familiar to the Indigenous Awajun people who worked with scientists. It is a type of bristlemouth armored catfish. Photo courtesy of Conservation International / Robinson Olivera. This dwarf squirrel species (Microsciurus sp.) is a very small squirrel that is difficult to spot in the rainforest where it moves quickly and hides among tree branches. After proper taxonomic revision, this species that is new to science will also belong to a new genus. Photo courtesy of Conservation International/Ronald Diaz. A semi-aquatic (amphibious) mouse (Daptomys sp.) that is new to science from Peru’s Alto Mayo. The species belongs to a group of rodents that is considered among the rarest in the world, and the few species that are known have only been observed a handful of times by scientists, with much still to be learned about their ecology. Photo courtesy of Conservation International/Ronald Diaz.
In Peru’s densely populated Alto Mayo region, home to 280,000 people, scientists working with local communities documented 27 species previously unknown to Western science.
The species included an amphibious mouse (Necromys aquaticus) found in just one patch of swamp forest; a fish with an unexplained blob-like head structure (Trichomycterus sp. nov.); an agile dwarf squirrel (Microsciurus sp. nov.); and a tree-climbing salamander (Bolitoglossa sp. nov.). These findings demonstrate how even human-modified landscapes can harbor biodiversity not yet documented by scientists.
Leopardus pardinoides, or the clouded tiger cat, as a new species. This small wildcat is found in the cloud forests of Costa Rica, south to Panama, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. Colombia and Costa Rica are key locations for the conservation. Image courtesy of Camilo Botero.
Scientists formally described a new small wild cat species, the clouded tiger cat (Leopardus pardinoides), found in high-altitude cloud forests from Central to South America. This taxonomic clarification has major conservation implications, as new data indicate all three tiger cat species have experienced dramatic range reductions, with the clouded tiger cat’s habitat particularly threatened by human activities.
The ghost palm (Plectocomiopsis hantu) from Borneo was already known to local communities. Benedikt Kuhnhäuser / RBG Kew
Though long used by local Iban communities in western Borneo for basketry and edible shoots, scientists finally gave a formal name to a distinctive rattan palm after 90 years. Named Plectocomiopsis hantu (“hantu” meaning ghost in Indonesian and Malay), the palm is known for its ghostly appearance, with white undersides to the leaves and gray stems. It’s currently known from only three locations in or near protected rainforest habitats.
Scientists named an entirely new family of plants, Afrothismiaceae, which have evolved to take all their nutrients from fungal partners rather than through photosynthesis. Found in African forests, these rare plants only appear above ground to fruit and flower. Most species in this family are extremely rare or possibly extinct, with the majority recorded only once in Cameroon.
Indonesia is home to exceptional biodiversity including the orchid Dendrobium cokronagoroi (left) and Mediocalcar gemma-corona (right), two of the five new orchids described from Indonesia. Photos courtesy of Jeffrey Champion and Andre Schuiteman RBG Kew.
The orchid family is immense, and new species are found most years. This year, researchers described five new species from islands throughout Indonesia. These are: Coelogyne albomarginata from Sumatra, Coelogyne spinifera from Seram, and Dendrobium cokronagoroi, the Dendrobium wanmae (a critically endangered species) and Mediocalcar gemma-coronae (endangered), all from western New Guinea.
The habitat of Chlorohiptage vietnamensis is being destroyed for the manufacture of cement. Photo courtesy of Truong VanDo/RBG Kew.
A new genus and species of green-flowered liana, Chlorohiptage vietnamensis, was discovered in Vietnam but is already assessed as critically endangered. Its limestone karst habitat is being cleared for quarries to make cement, threatening the only known population of this unique plant.
Small-clawed otter (Aonyx cinereus), the world’s tiniest otter species, photographed for the first time in Kaziranga. Photo courtesy of Arun Vignesh. Binturong (Arctictis binturong), the largest civet species, was also photographed for the first time in Kaziranga. Photo courtesy of Chirantanu Saikia.
Two new mammal species in were described in Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve, Northeast India’s biggest national park. A forest officer documented the presence of the small-clawed otter (Aonyx cinereus), the world’s tiniest otter species. The small-clawed otter, protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972, joins two other otter species already known to inhabit Kaziranga.
The binturong (Arctictis binturong), an elusive nocturnal tree-dweller also known as the bearcat, was photographed by tour guide Chirantanu Saikia in January 2024. The binturong is found exclusively in Northeast India and requires dense forest canopy for survival. It has become increasingly rare due to deforestation.
While local residents had previously reported sightings of both species, these photographs provide the first concrete evidence of their presence in the park. Conservation officials believe these discoveries suggest the potential presence of other undocumented species within the park, highlighting the importance of continued wildlife surveys and protection efforts in the region.
Brachycephalus dacnis rests on a fingertip. Photo courtesy of Lucas Machado Botelho.
Scientists in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest described a remarkable new species of frog, Brachycephalus dacnis, measuring just 6.95 millimeters in length – about the size of a pencil eraser. Unlike other similarly tiny frogs that often struggle with balance, this species has maintained its inner ear structure, allowing it to jump gracefully up to 32 times its body length. The discovery in São Paulo state’s remaining Atlantic Forest highlights both the region’s rich biodiversity and the urgent need for conservation, as this critically threatened ecosystem now stands at just 13% of its original extent, potentially harboring many more undiscovered species.
Banner image of Leopardus pardinoides, or the clouded tiger cat, as a new species. This small wildcat is found in the cloud forests of Costa Rica, south to Panama, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. Image courtesy of Johanes Pfleiderer.
Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay and holds a Ph.D. in ecology and evolutionary biology from Tulane University, where she studied the microbiomes of trees. View more of her reporting here.
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Scientists captured the first-ever camera collar footage of wild Andean bears, revealing unprecedented behaviors, including canopy mating and cannibalism.
The research team, led by Indigenous researcher Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya, successfully tracked a male bear for four months in Peru’s challenging cloud forest terrain.
The footage challenges previous assumptions about Andean bears being solitary vegetarians and shows them behaving more like other bear species.
While the bears face mounting threats from climate change and human conflict, researchers are combining scientific study with community education to protect them.
In the mountains of Peru, where ancient cloud forests meet the Amazon Rainforest, an Andean bear made scientific history. For four months, a camera collar captured the wild male’s daily life, revealing behaviors never before documented in the Southern Hemisphere’s only bear species, from treetop mating rituals to unexpected acts of cannibalism.
The study, published in Ecology and Evolution, provides a bear’s-eye view of life in one of South America’s steepest and wettest terrains and marks the first time this technology has been used on the species.
“For 15 years, I’ve been traveling up and down that valley and never seen a bear,” Andrew Whitworth, executive director of Osa Conservation and co-author of the study, told Mongabay. “So, the prospect of capturing a bear was quite insane. … These are just sheer walls of cloud forest.”
Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya, a National Geographic Explorer and the study’s lead author, led the research team. She says her work to protect the Andean bears of Peru is inspired by the legends of her Indigenous Quechua heritage.
National Geographic Explorer, Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya, attaches a trail camera to the branch of a tall tree in the buffer Zone of Manu National Park, Madre de Dios. Photo courtesy of Pablo Durana via National Geographic and Rolex Perpetual Planet Amazon Expedition.
Guardians of the Andes
Andean bears also hold profound cultural significance in Andean communities. “In Andean Quechua culture, Andean bears are known as Ukuku or Ukumary. The Ukukus are mythical beings, half-human and half-bear,” Pillco Huarcaya told Mongabay in a text message. “I wish people knew that Andean bears are the guardians of the mountains and vital ambassadors for the conservation of cloud forests, their primary habitat.”
To better understand these mountain guardians, in 2023, the team deployed camera collars on three wild Andean bears (Tremarctos ornatus) in Peru’s Kosñipata Valley. The first two collars were pilot studies that used National Geographic’s CritterCam. However, the study is based on just one longer-term collar worn by a male bear for four months, revealing many behaviors scientists have never seen before.
The footage challenged long-held assumptions about Andean bears being solitary vegetarians. Instead, it showed them as social creatures, having both peaceful and aggressive interactions with other bears.
Love in the Canopy
During his four months under observation, the male bear engaged in two remarkable courtship periods. The first, a weeklong encounter in December 2023, documented something never before seen: Andean bears mating in the tree canopy. The bears were filmed coupling high above the ground in at least eight video clips. A second female encountered the male in March, though no mating was recorded.
“There seems to be these sort of very intimate moments when he’s with a female and they’re hanging out in the same tree, just looking at one another,” Whitworth said. While Andean bears have long been considered solitary, the footage showed the pairs remaining together for days at a time and sleeping next to each other, suggesting their social lives may be more complex than previously understood.
The bear’s agility in the canopy wasn’t limited to mating. The bear was also filmed feeding 20-30 meters [65-98 feet] up into the top of a Cecropia tree. “I remember being really shocked when we saw this,” Whitworth said. “These are fast-growing, very spindly, hollow trees that snap really easily, and we see this bear 30 m up feeding on seeds. Holy smokes!”
Camera collar footage of the male Andean bear interacting with a female Andean bear. Credit: Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya/National Geographic.
Bears will be bears
The footage also revealed that Andean bears are not purely vegetarians but have an omnivorous behavior typical of other bear species. Camera collars caught them eating insects and meat along with fruit, bromeliads and even stinging nettles.
In one surprising discovery, the collared bear was recorded feeding on the carcass of a woolly monkey (Lagothrix cana), the first documented case of an Andean bear consuming a primate. Nine video clips captured the sequence of events, showing the bear first with the monkey’s carcass on the ground before carrying it into the tree canopy, where the primate’s hand was clearly visible. The footage suggests the bear discovered the already-deceased monkey while foraging rather than hunting it.
Even more dramatic were two instances of cannibalism caught on camera. In mid-November 2023, just a month before his mating season, the bear was recorded feeding on a dead bear cub over three days, starting with the head and moving to the stomach.
In a second incident on New Year’s Day 2024, after a long journey crossing the Kosñipata Valley, the bear was filmed in the canopy consuming what appeared to be the partially eaten carcass of another small bear.
While cannibalism has been previously reported in Andean bears in Ecuador, this could be the first documented case of infanticide in Andean bears, a behavior known in other bear species. These videos suggest these bears may be more similar to their northern cousins than previously thought.
“When you look at everything that we’ve recorded,” Whitworth said, “you realize it’s just like any other bear.” This simple observation might be the study’s most profound finding, Whitworth said. Beneath the mystery and mythology, Andean bears are just bears being bears.
An Andean Bear (Tremarctos ornatus) in Parque Nacional del Rio Abiseo, Peru. The species is listed as Vulnerable to extinction in the IUCN Red List and is the only bear species in the Southern Hemisphere. Image by Pedro Peloso courtesy of National Geographic and Rolex Perpetual Planet Amazon Expedition.
How to catch a bear
Collaring an Andean bear in Peru’s steep cloud forests required ingenuity and patience. The team used an “Iznachi trap,” essentially a large box with a guillotine-style door that drops when a bear enters to take the bait. But first, they had to get the trap into position.
“We had to design it where it was in panels that could be put on your back, and you could hoist these big metal panels out through these mountains,” Whitworth said. “It was pretty dangerous.”
Working with a local mechanic, they created a portable version the team could carry in pieces and assemble on-site. Each trap was connected to a satellite transmitter that would immediately alert researchers via email when triggered.
The process of actually catching a bear required careful preparation. “You don’t arm the trap at first; you kind of want them to just get used to coming in for the bait,” Whitworth said.
Using camera traps, the team spent a year identifying where individual bears hung out before attempting any captures. This allowed them to target specific animals while avoiding females with cubs. The trap’s design ensured only bears could trigger it. “It’s so heavy that pulling the prongs from this big door is actually real hard for an animal to do,” Whitworth said. “If a fox comes, they’ll nibble on the meat, but they’re not strong enough to pull it and trigger the trap.”
Once a bear is caught, the teams head to the field to immobilize it using a precise combination of drugs. During the immobilization, veterinarians conducted health evaluations and fitted a collar with GPS tracking onto the bear.
National Geographic Explorer, Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya, holds up footage of an Andean bear exploring the bear cage her team set up. Photo courtesy of Andy Whitworth/National Geographic.
Tracking technology
The collars are designed to be released remotely via satellite, typically after about three months. The researchers wait until the bear is in an area where they think they can retrieve the collar, then send a signal to fire a release mechanism. However, the process isn’t always straightforward.
“The problem is that collar has been on the bear for a few months, and a bunch of gunk can just sort of keep it closed,” Whitworth said. “So sometimes you don’t find the collar in the place where the release went. It can take two or three hours to wiggle off, and the animal could have moved kilometers.”
Even after successfully tracking a collar’s location, retrieving it from the precipitous terrain proved its own adventure. During one recovery attempt, a swollen river separated the team from their quarry. The solution emerged from the community itself.
“Ruth hired a bunch of the local people and we built a makeshift bridge to sort of scramble over this raging torrent,” Whitworth said, highlighting how local knowledge and collaboration often proved crucial to the project’s success.
After retrieving the collar, researchers anxiously waited to see if the data were successfully recorded. Despite these challenges, the team has had been largely successful in recovering their equipment. Across their broader mammal research program, they’ve retrieved 19 out of 20 collars deployed on various species.
This high recovery rate helps justify the steep cost of the technology, around $5,000 per camera collar. The study authors argue the investment is worthwhile when compared with the total cost of bear research.
The bigger challenge, Whitworth noted, is making this technology accessible to researchers in tropical regions where many poorly understood species live. He said that financial support from National Geographic and Rolex allowed the team to take risks on expensive technology, “but for a lot of researchers in the Global South, those risks are unattainable unless they can get access to the resources.”
Beyond the technical and financial challenges, the footage offered something unique: a glimpse into how an Andean bear experiences its world. Whitworth describes the wonder of seeing from a bear’s perspective, noting that the bear would sometimes stop at a vista and look out over the landscape, much like humans do on a hike.
“He’ll be walking and then all of a sudden, he’ll just stop in some beautiful part of the Andes and look out over the river and the valley,” Whitworth said. “He’s probably smelling and looking at his surroundings, but you get the idea that he’s seeing the land, in some respects, how we see it. It’s pretty incredible.”
Camera collar footage of the male Andean bear walking along a river. Credit: Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya/National Geographic.
Seeds of survival
However, understanding Andean bear behavior isn’t just amusing. These large mammals play an important role in the ecosystem, eating seeds and then dispersing them over large distances. This service helps maintain the immense biodiversity of the cloud forest, an ecosystem critical to the water cycle of the entire Amazon Basin.
Yet the bears’ vital role in the ecosystem is at risk. Listed as threatened by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List, there are estimated to be fewer than 20,000 Andean bears left in the wild.
The species faces pressures from multiple directions. As the climate becomes hotter and drier, their habitat is pushed upward. At the same time, human activities like farming are moving in from above, leaving the bears less room to roam.
“Sadly, I don’t see things improving for Andean bears anytime soon,” Whitworth said. “There are some scary predictions about cloud forest loss under current climate warming scenarios.”
This squeeze on their habitat forces bears to adapt their movements and behavior. They rarely stay within a national park, instead passing through multiple protected areas and community lands—sometimes raiding crops or in very rare cases preying on livestock. This can lead to retaliatory killings by local people. Camera footage paired with GPS tracking can help researchers and communities understand why bears are going to community lands, what risks they take, and perhaps how to avoid conflicts.
Community conservation
In response to these challenges, Pillco Huarcaya’s team is also working to expand their community engagement efforts, transforming their field station into what Whitworth called a “community conservation campus.”
“My work with children has had a significant impact on how the community views Andean bears,” Pillco Huarcaya said. “Through our ‘Conservation Ambassadors’ program, children visit the Wayqecha Biological Station to learn about the bears and the cloud forest. Many of them didn’t know about Andean bears before, and now they see them as friends that need to be protected.”
Despite the challenges, Whitworth said he remains cautiously optimistic. The behaviors captured by the camera collars demonstrate the bears’ intelligence and adaptability. “If there is a species that can change fast and learn quickly,” he says, “it’s a bear.”
A male Andean bear, and his paw. Credit: Ruthmery Pillco Huarcaya/National Geographic.
Banner image of Andean Bear (Tremarctos ornatus) in Parque Nacional del Rio Abiseo, Peru. Image by Pedro Peloso courtesy of National Geographic and Rolex Perpetual Planet Amazon Expedition.
Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay and holds a Ph.D. in ecology and evolutionary biology from Tulane University, where she studied the microbiomes of trees. View more of her reporting here.
Pillco Huarcaya, R., Whitworth, A., Mamani, N., Thomas, M., Condori, E., (2024) Through the eyes of the Andean bear: Camera collar insights into the life of a threatened South American Ursid. Ecology and Evolution 14(12) doi: 10.1002/ece3.70304
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In the Amazon, the rubber boom was facilitated by new technological developments, industrialization and political change.
While in Brazil the rubber barons used a form of debt slavery with their workers, in Bolivia the rubber boom was dominated by pioneers from Santa Cruz who had established cattle ranches in the Beni during the nineteenth century.
In Peru, the boom was based on the exploitation of Castilla species rather than Hevea, resulting into a much more destructive process, which developed a particularly cruel and exploitive slave-labor system.
The invention of vulcanized rubber (1839), followed by the popularization of bicycles (1870s) and the invention of the automobile (1886), led to exponential growth in the demand for rubber, which was manufactured from latex produced by several species of trees endemic to the Amazon forest. The supply of rubber was a component of the trade in the drogas de sertão, which included latex collected from multiple species of two genera, Hevea and Castilla. The most valuable species were members of the genus Hevea, because their latex could be tapped rather than harvested from a felled tree, as was the case for Castilla. This difference soon led to the development of a Hevea supply chain anchored in remote outposts permanently manned by individuals who would collect the latex, process it into rubber using artisanal technologies and sell it to a trader for transport downriver to an export agency in Belem, Manaus or Iquitos.
At the outset, most rubber was collected by Indigenous communities residing in mission villages or Ribeirinhos who supplemented their subsistence livelihoods with trade in forest products. Strong annual growth in the demand for rubber quickly exceeded the ability of the resident population to provide a steady supply, however, stimulating the flow of migrants into the region.
During the last half of the nineteenth century, mass migration was facilitated by new technologies. Telegraph systems and newspapers alerted individuals to new opportunities, while trains and steamships would transport them across oceans and continents. Social mobility catalyzed by industrialization and democratic revolutions contributed to sudden migratory events symbolized by the gold rushes of California, the Yukon and South Africa. The Amazon became a global destination for adventurers seeking to strike it rich by joining a new global commodity boom.
The extent of the rubber economy was defined by the distribution of Hevea, where the latex was sustainably harvested by tapping over many years, and Castilla, where collectors sacrificed the tree to harvest a much larger, but one-time, crop of latex. Data source: Priyadarshan and Goncalves 2003.
Brazil
Most of these international migrants were poorly suited to the task, however, and the most successful rubber merchants were native-born entrepreneurs. These men were adept at leveraging local knowledge with political influence and the use of violence to dominate the wilderness landscapes they claimed as their fiefdoms. Known throughout the world as ‘rubber barons’, in Brazil they were called seringalistas. They were successful because they acquired monopoly control over a specific tributary, which allowed them to ruthlessly exploit their workers, who were known as seringueiros.
The seringalistas would advance the novice seringueiros supplies at inflated prices, establishing a debt so large that the worker could never fully repay it – a condition for his departure from a remote rubber post. Known as aviamento, this form of debt slavery was particularly effective for entrapping migrants who were not skilled at living off forest resources and who lacked a support system of Indigenous or Ribeirinha communities that might have offered them an escape route.
Among the most consequential of Brazilian rubber barons was João Gabriel de Carvalho e Melo, an explorer and entrepreneur who was among the first individuals to discover the rich stands of Hevea trees on the upper Purus River in the late 1850s. This occurred at the dawn of the rubber boom, and the demand for seringueiros had already surpassed the capacity of the Ribeirinha communities to provide the requisite labour. João Gabriel returned to his hometown of Uruburetama, Ceará, where he recruited a cadre of friends and relatives who would return with him in 1874 to establish a series of rubber posts on Acre and Purus rivers.
Their migration coincided with a series of calamitous events in Northeast Brazil, including the collapse of the international cotton market (1865–1870) and a multi-year drought (1877–1880) that destroyed the regional economy. Famine forced more than 200,000 Nordestinos, almost all Caboclos, to emigrate. Approximately half headed for the Amazon, where the seringalistas were ready to loan them money and locate them on remote forest tracts as contract employees. Approximately 30,000 Nordestinos moved into the upper reaches of the Purus and Juruá rivers.
This inflow of Brazilian citizens further consolidated Brazil’s hold on its Amazonian territories and set the stage for one final expansion of its dominion, despite the 1867 Treaty of Ayacucho, which had adjudicated the territory of Acre to Bolivia. Acre was a roadless forest wilderness, and Bolivia had yet to effectively occupy the territory, which was populated entirely by Indigenous tribes. The region could be easily accessed by river from Manaus, however. Once it became obvious that the region was a treasure trove of natural rubber, the Bolivian government moved to occupy the province and enlisted influential foreign investors to finance the region’s development. They acted too late.
Tens of thousands of Brazilians poured into Acre in the 1890s. Although Bolivian troops staged campaigns and counterattacks, they had to traverse dense forest landscapes from their military outposts on the Río Madre de Dios. Known in Brazil as the Revolução do Acre, it was fought by an army of immigrant filibusters who created a short-lived independent republic (1899–1903). Although they acted autonomously, they enjoyed the support of authorities in Manaus, Belem and Rio de Janeiro. Brazil formally annexed the territory after the two countries signed the Treaty of Persépolis in 1903. By 1910, Acre had a population of approximately 50,000 and was producing about 60% of the rubber in the Brazilian Amazon.
Although Bolivia had little choice but to cede control of the province, the two countries negotiated a compensation agreement that included the construction of a railway that would circumvent the rapids on the Río Madeira. The new railroad, which would be built in what is now the Brazilian state of Rondônia, would provide Bolivia with an expedited commercial route for its Amazonian territories. This was the era of railroad investment mania, and investors in London and New York poured capital into the scheme, a formidable engineering undertaking because of the region’s remoteness and the threat of tropical diseases. A previous effort in the 1870s ended in litigation and bankruptcy. The Brazilian government made it a national priority, however, and it was built between 1907 and 1912.
The Estrada de Ferro Madeira-Mamoré (EFMM) was a massive project that employed between 2,000 to 3,000 men during the height of construction. It suffered enormous labour turnover, however, due to severe working conditions and endemic disease. By some estimates, as many as 30,000 men and women were employed over the life of the project, with a loss of life that exceeded 6,000 individuals. Many were foreigners who were ill-prepared for the tropical climate, but there was another infusion of Caboclos from Northeast Brazil. Ironically, the rail line was completed just as the Amazonian rubber industry collapsed because of competition from plantations in Malaysia.
The first national census of Brazil in 1872 enumerated 323,000 residents in the states of Pará, up from around 85,000 after the Cabanagem massacres. This was before the onset of the rubber boom (~1890), when the influx of Nordestinos surpassed 20,000 per year. Between 300,000 and 500,000 eventually would migrate into the basin, radically transforming the demographic profile of the Brazilian Amazon. By 1910, the non-Indigenous population in Pará, Amazonas and Acre exceeded 1.2 million, while estimates of Indigenous people had fallen to below 100,000.
The upper Rio Juruá was settled by seringueiros after about 1890; Cruzeiro do Sul was established in 1904 after Bolivia ceded Acre to Brazil in the Treaty of Persopolis. The town was connected to the Brazilian highway network in the late 1970s and has experienced steady growth due to the inflow of settlers who have established smallholdings in the surrounding upland landscapes. Source: Google Earth.
Bolivia
The Bolivian rubber boom was markedly different from its Brazilian counterpart because it was dominated by pioneers from Santa Cruz who had established cattle ranches in the Beni during the nineteenth century. These experienced frontiersmen were well positioned to occupy the forests along the Madre de Dios, Mamore and Iténez (Guaporé) rivers. The most successful of these entrepreneurs, Nicolás Suárez Callaú, established a trading post at Cachuela Esperanza near the junction of the Madre de Dios and Mamore rivers, where rapids obligated traders to portage their merchandise through his installations. Although nowhere near the size of Manaus or Iquitos, Cachuela Esperanza was the centre of the Bolivian rubber trade, with a radiotelegraph, cinema, state-of-the-art hospital, machine shops and, of course, warehouses to store rubber, which in Bolivia is called goma. Suárez also owned steamships, which he used to transport his merchandise and people both above and below the rapids that characterise this section of the Rio Madeira.
By 1912, the Casa Suárez controlled about 60% of Bolivian rubber production and had opened offices in London and other cities. Including his family’s cattle ranches in the Beni, the enterprise extended over 180,000 square kilometres. Suárez was also a patriotic Bolivian who financed a large portion of the country’s armed forces in the Acre War. Self-interest no doubt drove his determination to protect his monopoly, but, without his intervention, Bolivia probably would have lost most of the present day Department of Pando.
Most of the gomeros employed by the Casa Suárez were internal migrants from the lowland provinces of Bolivia, including Mestizos from the city of Santa Cruz, but also native Moxeños and Chiquitanos drafted from the mission villages established in the previous century. Nicolás Suárez and his brothers used a form of debt slavery similar to the Brazilian system, but the gomeros were part of a subservient patrón-peón system that prevailed in the rural landscapes of Chiquitania and Beni. Since they were part of an established serf-like system, they were also more likely to be accompanied by women, which undoubtedly contributed to their reputation for docility.
Less acculturated natives also were recruited, particularly the Tacana, who were skilled forest guides capable of locating populations of rubber trees. Unsurprisingly, the incursion of outsiders accelerated the decline of Indigenous peoples, especially the Araona, who were estimated to have a population of more than 20,000 in 1900, but today number fewer than a hundred. The Tacana have fared better, although their cultural legacy was changed through intermarriage with migrant workers from the south. Their descendants pursue subsistence livelihoods, but many live in the towns of Riberalta, Rurrenabaque and Guayaramerím. Some work as wildcat miners on dredges exploiting placer gold deposits along the Beni and Madre de Dios rivers.
The Estrada de Ferro Madeira-Mamoré (EFMM) was built between 1907 and 1912 as part of the compensation Bolivia received for ceding the Acre territory to Brazil. Courtesy of the Dana B. Merrill Collection, Museu Paulista (2011).
Peru and Colombia
The Jesuits and their successors were successful in keeping the Brazilian bandeirantes from encroaching into the Maynas province, but the onset of the rubber boom required more forceful action. In 1877, the Peruvian government sent three steamboats to establish a military base at Iquitos and reaffirmed that nation’s control over Maynas, whose territorial sovereignty was disputed by both Ecuador and Colombia. The village evolved into a small city and became a major centre for the trade of caucho, the Peruvian term for natural rubber. Like Manaus, Iquitos boasted opulent hotels and luxury items imported directly from Europe, which catered to Peru’s barones del caucho.
The production of caucho was based on the exploitation of Castilla species rather than Hevea; consequently, it was a much more destructive process, which developed a particularly cruel and exploitive slave-labor system. Because the whole tree was harvested, it produced a larger volume of rubber, which generated phenomenal revenue flows over the short term. The caucheros had no incentive to develop long-term rubber tapping stations. Rather, they sought out populations of Castilla that tended to occur in clumps of several hundred trees. Unsurprisingly, they would exterminate one local population and move on to the next.
The extractive nature of the system also influenced their need for labour. Instead of a docile peon who could be manipulated over years of drudgery, they relied on experienced woodsmen who could identify the Castilla groves and enslaved peons to fell trees and collect the latex. They would migrate with the former and conscript the latter from local Indigenous communities, typically by force, as they needed them. Historians have termed this terrorist slavery, because the caucheros were extraordinarily cruel and treated their peons as an expendable commodity that could be replaced as they expanded into new territories.
The most infamous of the Peruvian rubber barons was Julio César Arana del Águila, known as the Rey del Caucho because he organised a monopoly cartel extending from the Huallaga River to the Putumayo. Arana was ambitious, sophisticated and audacious, as exemplified by his decision to capitalise his enterprise on the London stock exchange as the ‘Peruvian Amazon Company’. Because travel to Iquitos from Lima could take weeks, Maynas was essentially an autonomous region, now known as Loreto, and the central government depended on Arana to project Peruvian sovereignty on frontier lands then disputed by Peru, Brazil, Colombia and Ecuador.
As in Brazil, the Ribereña population was unable to supply enough labour to meet the demand for rubber tappers. Arana initially imported labour from Brazil and the Caribbean, but soon elected to prey on the Indigenous nations of the Putumayo, particularly the Huitoto, Ocaina and Bora tribes, which were known for their peaceful (non-warlike) culture. His lieutenants were extraordinarily cruel and committed heinous crimes that today would be considered genocidal, including murder, kidnapping, rape, torture and enslavement. They were accused of exterminating entire villages during alcohol-driven bouts of sadistic entertainment.
The Indigenous people who avoided slavery suffered another round of disease and death. Here a Karipuna family near Porto Velho interacting with the photographer hired by the Estrada de Ferro Madeira- Mamoré. Reportedly, between 60 and 70 individuals survived into the current decade (Angelo 2023). Credit: Colecao Dana Merrill (2011).
Their actions were eventually revealed by an American who had travelled to the Amazon in search of wealth and adventure. Walter Hardenburg fell prey to the machinations of the Peruvian Amazon Company, but managed to escape and publish an exposé in a progressive London newspaper.
The resulting scandal motivated the British government to commission an enquiry under the direction of Roger Casement, a diplomat and civil rights advocate then serving as Consul General in Rio de Janeiro. His report, published in 1911, was corroborated by two Peruvian judges and a French journalist, which forced the House of Commons to investigate the atrocities. Julio César Arana testified in person and denied the allegations – or at least knowledge of the crimes. His employees avoided prosecution by disappearing, while Arana went on to represent Iquitos in the Peruvian Senate.
Like most rubber companies of the epoch, the Peruvian Amazon Company filed for bankruptcy in 1913, but during its two decades of operation it exported over 4,000 tons of rubber valued at about 1.5 million British pounds – an amount that, adjusted for inflation, would equal about US$ 300 million in 2022. Although the Peruvian Amazon experienced an inflow of migrants, the Indigenous inhabitants on the Putumayo were devastated, falling from about 50,000 in 1890 to only 6,000 in 1920, when Colombia and Peru enumerated the inhabitants as they demarcated the boundary between their countries.
The other major Rey del Caucho was Carlos Fermín Fitzcarrald López, the son of an Irish immigrant who exploited Castilla populations on the Ucayali and the Madre de Dios rivers. He is famous because he built a railroad across an eleven-kilometer isthmus separating the two watersheds. His goal was to create an export route from the Madre de Dios that avoided the interference of the Bolivians and Brazilians. He drowned at age 35, when one his steamboats capsized while trying to navigate rapids on the upper Urubamba River.
Fitzcarrald exploited Indigenous labor by deploying detribalized Indigenous crews in wilderness areas in the upper Ucayali and Madre de Dios watersheds, where he would entice uncontacted Indigenous groups into clearings and capture them for his slave-fueled enterprise. He enjoyed the collaboration of certain predatory Indigenous chiefs who would raid unsuspecting tribes; those that resisted were massacred. Fitzcarrald’s actions eventually led to the division of the Piro ethnic nation into two tribes: those who were coerced into servitude are now known as the Yine, while those who retreated into the wilderness are the Mashco.
Fitzcarrald’s death opened the Madre de Dios to a Spanish immigrant, Máximo Rodríguez Gonzales, who established a network that bordered, and blocked, the advance of the Bolivian rubber tappers employed by the Casa Suárez. Simultaneously, the Peruvians and Brazilians adjudicated their boundary areas on the upper Purus River, largely to Brazil’s benefit, because long stretches of the river had been occupied by seringueiros tapping the extensive Hevea groves that contributed to Acre’s preeminence in the Amazonian rubber industry.
Banner image: A clan of the so-called “Free Indians of the Ucayali River”, probably Shipibo-Conibo. Credit: Hardeman, 2012.
“A Perfect Storm in the Amazon” is a book by Timothy Killeen and contains the author’s viewpoints and analysis. The second edition was published by The White Horse in 2021, under the terms of a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).
To read earlier chapters of the book, find Chapter One here, Chapter Two here, Chapter Three here, Chapter Four here and Chapter Five here.
Chapter 6. Culture and demographic defines the present
