Conservation in ACTION

Across the Paso del Istmo biological corridor, bats perform ecological services ranging from pollination to pest control. Pictured above is a Mexican fruit bat (Artibeus jamaicensis), documented by wildlife photographer Bruce Taubert, just one of 44 species of bats we're working to understand and protect.

Carol Chambers, a bat biologist from Northern Arizona University, just spent her sabbatical in Nicaragua studying bat populations in fragmented landscapes like those found in Paso del Istmo. Working with Bat Conservation International and 15 other bat researchers she worked in the field conducting research to strengthen our conservation efforts in Nicaragua.

Two of her students, Jose Gabriel Martinez and Marlon Chaves, are still in the field, placing AnaBat devices across the landscape and recording bat activity. (An anabat is a monitoring system which detects and analyzes bats' echolocation calls.) Thanks to the mentorship of Chambers, Kim Williams-Guillén, and Arnulfo Medina, these budding conservation scientists are at the cornerstone of our commitment to build local capacity to study and protect bats, crucial to the ecosystems and agricultural economy of Central America.

As with all our initiatives, we are combining scientific research and conservation efforts with community outreach. Before leaving Carol contributed to our environmental education program in Ostional with a nighttime bat workshop for school children. Thanks to the support of Bat Conservation International, our bat conservation campaign will include additional workshops and learning materials for school children as well as agriculture agents in the coming months.

To learn more about Valuing the Ecosystem Services of Bats, please visit our website.

We are grateful to wildlife photographer Bruce Taubert for his fabulous bat photos. The pair pictured to the right are Lava tube bats. You can see more of Taubert's bat photos here.

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Paso Pacífico in the News

One of our CGI commitment partners, the Ocean Recovery Alliance, took the Global Alert project to The Economist's World Oceans Summit in Singapore last week. For more information about the Global Alert, empowering individuals and communities to reduce trash in waterways, watch this video.

Last week, we also participated in Flora and Fauna International's press conference to disseminate the results of the “Yo No Como Huevos” campaign to discourage the consumption of sea turtle eggs.

We're also pleased about Planet Action's “In Depth Coverage” of our program to Rebuild Landscape Connectivity and Ecosystem Services for Wildlife Conservation and Sustainable Community Development. Planet Action, a non-profit initiative dedicated to promoting cooperative approaches to climate change, is generously providing us with satellite imagery to help gauge the connectivity of migratory corridors in Paso del Istmo. Our other partners in this reforestation project, led by Kim Williams-Guillén, are CarbonFund.org and the University of Wisconsin – Osh Kosh.

Partnerships make it possible

Our commitment to an integrative approach means every goal we set as an organization is achieved with the cooperation of multiple partners and stakeholders.

For example, as we continue our work to increase the populations of critically endangered sea turtles, we work with the following organizations.

DANIDA (the Danish International Cooperation Agency) has provided funding and guidance for our Coastal Marine Research project, which includes school murals celebrating the biodiversity of the Paso del Istmo biological corridor.

RageJax Foundation helped us commission the school murals.

The Turner Foundation has contributed financial support and expertise to our turtle ranger program.

Flora & Fauna International have led the “Yo No Como Huevos” campaign to get people to pledge not to eat turtle eggs.

PRETOMA scientists helped conduct our fisheries assessment as well as turtle first aid workshops.

The University of Costa Rica marine science program helped us map turtle habitats and reefs.

SEE Turtles and SEEtheWILD help us fund turtle conservation through ecotourism.

For more information about our efforts to save endangered sea turtles, please visit our website.

For photos of our school murals, visit the RageJax Foundation's photo album on Facebook.