Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
parian forests. The shaggy creatures entered these forests and bathed in the water to cool
down. Jaguars tended to stay inside the park but occasionally wandered into nearby fields.
Pumas spent more time outside the park in areas with heavily forested groves lining rivers
and streams. Tapirs liked to be near springs close to the remaining forest fragments outside
the park.
Overall, the landscape matrix in this region was friendlier to rarity than most pessimistic
biologists would have predicted. Some of the large mammals survived massive land-use
change in the Cerrado because enough bits of natural habitat remained in the matrix to meet
their needs for food and cover. How long these vital pieces would remain before becoming
soy or sugarcane fields was an open question. Leandro was lobbying in favor of forever. He
is one of the few muddy-boots biologists who has learned to rub elbows with lawmakers, and
he spends as much time working with them as he does tracking jaguars. Leandro practices
what the best conservation biologists preach, that conservation is 10 percent science and 90
percent negotiation. He had fought hard to enact the current federal law requiring landowners
to keep a minimum of 20 to 30 percent of their property in natural vegetation, as well as to
keep their hands off development of river- and streamside forests. Depending on topography
and drainage systems, this measure potentially protects more than 35 percent of the Cerrado
outside the reserves.
The Round Table on Responsible Soy Association, an effort to bring together all the big
soy producers, conservation groups, and the Brazilian government, is trying to make cultiv-
ation more harmonious with nature conservation. Leandro's first step was to convince the
group that the best-practices goal of leaving 20 to 30 percent of land as natural habitat would
help the maned wolf persist in the Cerrado. It would be ideal if the protected areas were in
contiguous blocks connecting ranchlands in one area to those in another. Carly worried that
all of the set-asides would be in forests because including grassland in the 20 to 30 percent
mix of intact land would bite into the profits of the ranchers. Under the current system, the
big producers would benefit most by converting to agriculture as much grassland habitat as
allowed. And that is what is happening. Even with a law that sounds good on paper, legisla-
tion that is not based on strong science will have uneven results. The current law could con-
serve good jaguar and tapir habitat outside reserves but do little for the grassland-dependent
maned wolf.
The next morning, we were out early again with Mason. We stopped at a huge hole in
the ground. Here were the signature diggings of a giant armadillo, one dedicated earthmover.
“There must be an ant nest or termite mound nearby,” Carly said. Giant armadillos often ex-
cavate burrows to reach under the nests of their favorite prey. Few people have ever seen a
giant armadillo aboveground or in a zoo, so it's hard to picture one. A good start would be to
multiply the size of the common nine-banded armadillo by ten. The nine-banded armadillo,
the unofficial state mammal of Texas, is among the most common roadkill along highways
