CUYABENO LODGE

THE HISTORY OF THE CUYABENO FAUNA RESERVE

When in 1974, two young and enthusiastic national parks planners, Allen Putney and Daan Vreugdenhil, were invited by the Government of Ecuador to join its FAO (Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations) forestry project, a series of events took off that gradually changed the history of conservation in Ecuador. In that year, only the Galapagos National Park and the Cotopaxi National Park were set aside for conservation. Mainland Ecuador was still little known and two third of the country was still covered with primary forest: almost all of the Amazon region and the Eastern Andes slopes, half of the Western Andes slopes, the Esmeraldas coastal lowlands and a good part of the Guayas mangrove estuary. Under the visionary leadership of Allen, large teams of Ecuadorian and international technicians started to scout the nation for the best natural areas and gather information to their evaluation.

Literally the entire country was traveled: where they could go by jeep in the Andes and the western part of the country, they would do so until getting stuck in the mud or driving would get impossible for the presence of cliffs and jungle. From there they would take their field gear, hire native guides and walk the jungle for weeks until they had developed a first feel of what the area was about. For the Eastern part of the country, which was still completely forest clad and inaccessible, Daan Vreugdenhil was put in charge, and a special jungle team started roaming the Amazon region by motorized canoe as far as canoes would take them into the smallest creeks.

Many areas were almost impenetrable and the maps sometimes lacked accuracy. So what could not be traveled by canoe was explored from the air with small airplanes hired from missionary organizations. They landed at airstrips of isolated Indian tribes, often no longer than a football field, but as level as a freshly plowed corn field. Such Indian villages would than further serve as base camps for explorations on foot under guidance of indigenous people, who showed their territories and told about their ways of life.

The history of our partner, Colonel Luis Hernandez is also very much worth mentioning. One area was of extremely difficult access, being the Cordillera de Cutucu in the Shuar (formerly known as the "headhunters") territory. Rumors were that there were Inca treasures hidden in the Tallos Caves (Cuava de los Tallos), but all attempts to get there over land had failed. A special operation was needed involving the Military and the British Embassy. A young enthusiastic soldier, Luis Hernandez had become the focal point in the organization and logistics, while a young lady, Terry Hernandez, working at the British Embassy had become the main coordinator dealing with officials and foreign technicians. With great enthusiasm, both worked at this exiting challenge to find and explore these mystique caves, battling incredible logistic nightmares in mountainous terrain that is cloud covered most of the year, while at the same time juggling with the impossible agendas of high level military and civilian officials. Through endless helicopter searches, they did find the caves, but the caves did not hold the hidden Inca treasure. They did bring something else, instead, Luis and Terry fall in love, not only with each other, but also with the jungle. Currently, as a former Colonal in the Ecuadorian Army and politician, his love for nature and particularly for the Amazon, has been beneficial for conservation all along, always promoting the conservation cause. While helping out with the organization of scientific conservation expeditions, he often had himself dropped in by parachute during the weekend and then be flown out later to join his regimen during the week. His training programs would highlight respect for nature and whenever conservation conflict would come on his way, he would broker solutions.

After the areas had been studied during the second round, they were prioritized and categorized in about 9 different categories of management. Most of these categories were rather straight forward, like national parks and biological reserves. As very few of the officials that were involved during that period still are working in the national parks department (INEFAN) today, it may be interesting to tell you a little about the history and background of two of the categories: "Indigenous Reserves" and "Reserves for fauna production".

While Daan Vreugdenhil was working with the help of indigenous people in the Amazon region, he realized that in a matter of years, most indigenous people would lose their traditional lands to development. Bit by bit would their lands be taken over by landless families from elsewhere in the country, who were in search of a piece of land to start a new life. At the time, dealing with the rights of indigenous peoples was not as commonly incorporated in international projects as it is today.

There were no internationally recognized methods to deal with such issues. But Daan felt that this issue needed to be addressed urgently, and in the absence of an official government policy or legislation, the issue was incorporated in the protected areas policy. So together with the heads of the different tribes and in consultation with missionary groups, he tried to identify the heartlands of the different indigenous tribes. Sketchy, and incomplete as that information was at the time, it still got put on a map and incorporated in the Government's documentation. With the exception of Yasuni and Cuyabeno, the heartlands of indigenous peoples were not included in the suggested protected areas, but rather as specific indigenous people's lands. In Yasuni, less than 20 Waograni Indians were known to live somewhere in the last remaining major non-divided amazon land areas, while most of the tribe lived in the headwaters, which was proposed to be set aside as a separate targeted Indian land.

In the proposed Cuyabeno area. The situation was somewhat different. Cuyabeno was to become a "Fauna Production Reserve". Nowadays, very few people know the background of that category. In the middle of the nineteen seventies, the FAO was experimenting with wildlife farming and game cropping in Africa. So, the National Parks team felt it would be a good idea to try something similar in Ecuador, potentially to pay for conservation efforts with the revenues that might be generated from such a production. At the time, it was thought that it might be very beneficial for the indigenous people within the Cuyabeno Reservation, the Siona, to become a part of fauna production operations and thus create employment within the context of their own hunting and fishing culture. So in the proposal, Cuyabeno obtained the category of Fauna Production Reserve and the Siona were included within the heart of the reservation and Cuyabeno was protected accordingly. The original FAO report on the Strategy on the conservation of outstanding protected areas for Ecuador can be downloaded.

In the course of the years, as the worlds attention shifted more towards ecotourism and Ecuador was gathering more and more international fame for its Galapagos Islands, legislation was never put in place to allow for fauna production use, and looking back, that was a wise decision of the Government.  Now, for all practical purposes, Cuyabeno serves as a national park, and the Siona are heavily involved in the tourism operations, thus creating a durable income, while much more of their traditional lands stay in tact than for any other indigenous group in Ecuador.

Cuyabeno during the dry season, when breeding of birds and reptiles is at its peak.

By the end of 1976, all 92 areas had been evaluated and about a dozen were identified as being of the highest level of priority. The Ecuadorian Government took the recommendations at heart and in 1979, each one of the areas of highest priority was set aside for conservation, thus putting about 9 percent of the nation's territory under legal protection. Meanwhile, Allen Putney had moved on to the Caribbean and Daan Vreugdenhil to Africa to continue their pioneer work in conservation. But as history has shown, legal protection alone is not enough to put conserve an area, and a bit at the time, people started invading the edges of the legally protected areas; some worse than others. Cuyabeno had become a really bad case of illegal invasion. After roads for oil-exploitation had opened up the upper watershed the Eastern one-third of the reserve had become invaded by 1983.

Then, director of Cuyabeno, Flavio Coello invited Daan Vreugdenhil to come over and work at a solution. After having analyzed the situation, the two specialists concluded, that the upper watershed had to be given up as a protected area because it had been invaded by too many people. There was still enough uninhabited primary forest, however, to "move" the reservation eastward. They advised the government likewise and as a result, the reservation was  eventually extended until the border with Peru, to include the Lagarto Cocha Lakes system, thus making Cuyabeno the second largest protected area in Ecuador. In 1985, Daan Vreugdenhil was invited to participate in a UNEP mission to advise on sustainable development of the Amazon region of Ecuador. Cuyabeno was still suffering from continuing invasion pressure   and as Ecuador badly needed the oil revenues, oil exploitation continued to spread into many parts of the reserve. 

During numerous brainstorming sessions with the authorities, it was concluded that the only way to save the area would be through generating economic interests from the area through ecotourism.  Daan Vreugdenhil offered to try and raise some capital and initiate a special marketing effort to bring more visitors to Cuyabeno. The government agreed that it would be desirable to initiate an experimental lodge at the Cuyabeno Lakes to generate a national as well as international tourism interest to the area, as an alternative to deforestation for agriculture and cattle raising. From then on, a marketing effort to put Cuyabeno on the map as a destination for ecotourism gradually grew; several Ecuadorians and Daan Vreugdenhil and his wife Eveline initiated the foundation of Neotropic Turis Cia. Ltda, and each year they were bringing in more visitors to Cuyabeno. From 1986 until 1989, the guest were hosted under rather primitive conditions. In 1989 Neotropic Turis received its license from the Government to operate an experimental lodge for ecotourism and the construction could begin.

From the beginning, Neotropic Turis intended to work very closely with the Siona Indians. Even though, the company has its licenses to run its own canoes, it gives almost all of its business of transportation to the Indians. When the health situation among the Indians was still very poor, the company brought in a medical doctor every month and paid for treatment and even occasionally hospitalization, until services from the Government had improved. Neotropic Turis with its participating experts and know how, together with the Ministry of Agriculture, also provided and paid for training of guides as well as the Indians. Specific themes included Amazon ecology, birdwatching, guiding, hosting visitors and - on the request of the Siona women - in cooking and operating the lodge. During construction, the Sionas received intensive on the job training in carpentry, which served them to improve their own housing and build their own basic visitor camp.

The operation is now run by partner Luis (who now is a colonel in the Ecuadorian army) while Daan and Eveline Vreugdenhil remain important conservation advisors for the lodge. The Cuyabeno Lodge has gradually grown to maturity, offering great programs to the Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve, as stand alone packages or in combination with other programs, particularly Galapagos. The Cuyabeno Fauna Reserve has become one of the principle mainland destinations on the Ecuadorian mainland and most of the pressure of illegal invasion has eased up, in part thanks to the pioneering work of the Cuyabeno Lodge and its proud owners.