Cocha Cashu Biological Station - Visit the Cocha Cashu site

Cocha Cashu Biological Station is located in Manu National Park in southeast Peru. Founded as a research site over 25 years ago, this remote facility lies in a vast expanse of virgin habitat, and provides an ideal base from which to study all aspects of the ecology and biology of untouched lowland tropical forests. A grid of trails covers roughly 200 ha, and longer paths extend towards more distant microhabitats, such as palm swamps, sandy streams and uplands. Through an agreement with local tribespeople, the site has been free of hunting for over thirty years, and large birds and mammals are therefore relatively common. We visited the station in 2001 and 2004 to study one of the most charismatic of Amazonian birds, the Pale-winged Trumpeter, a species that elsewhere is usually rare and shy.

Los Amigos Research Centre (CICRA) - Visit the Los Amigos site

The Los Amigos watershed encompasses 1.6 million hectares of pristine Amazonian forest. Much of this wilderness lies within the Los Amigos conservation concession, which acts as a shield to the eastern portion of Manu, and forms a biological corridor between this famous park and the Tambopata Reserved Zone to the south. As such it reinforces the protection of wild lands in Amazonian Peru, arguably the most biodiverse region on the planet. The Research Centre is strategically located at the confluence of the Río Madre de Dios and the Río Los Amigos, allowing permanent control and monitoring of the only access point to the concession itself. A system of trails provides access to a rich mosaic of Amazonian habitats, including floodplain forest (dark green on the map below), upland forest (paler mottled areas away from the river), extensive stands of bamboo (paler still, yellowish) and palm swamps (purple).

We first visited the site in 2004 to carry out a pilot study of the role of song differences in maintaining reproductive isolation between two sympatric 'subspecies' of Warbling Antbird (Hypocnemis cantator peruviana and H. c. collinsi). On the basis of this work we are launching a long-term study of the behavioural ecology, speciation and conservation of antbirds, which we hope to conduct in close collaboration with scientists and students from Peru. We will return to Los Amigos in 2006 to establish colour-ringed populations and to continue field experiments.

Los Amigos, study trails.

Noel Kempff Mercado National Park - Visit the Noel Kempff site

Spanning over 1.5 million hectares in north-east Bolivia, Noel Kempff Mercado National Park lies at the southern fringe of Amazonia, and is thus part rainforest, part savanna. It protects important tracts of tall moist forest, gallery forest, seasonally flooded grassland and dry cerrado. The landscape is dominated by the spectacular Serranía de Huanchaca, an isolated 275 km2 sandstone escarpment rising abruptly from the surrounding forest. In 2002, we worked in a 350-ha forest island on top of the plateau and at two further sites-Los Fierros and Lago Caiman-in continuous forest at the south-western and northern bases of the plateau respectively. This project was carried out as part of a long-term investigation into the effects of geographic isolation on the behaviour, morphology and genetics of rainforest passerine birds. We will return to continue this work in October 2006.

Rio Cristalino Jungle Lodge - Visit the Rio Cristalino site

Cristalino Jungle Lodge is a private reserve that protects some of the most threatened forest in Southern Amazonia, a region noted for its diversity, levels of endemism, and extreme rates of deforestation at the hands of soya farmers and logging corporations. The lodge itself borders Cristalino State Park in Mato Grosso, south-central Brazil, and marks the southern extremity of a vital protected area that runs northward into the adjacent state of Pará. Via a comprehensive trail system and a renowned canopy platform, it provides access to around 100 ha of tall tropical forest, including drier woodland on rocky escarpments. In 2004 we visited the area to study the function of duetting in the local 'subspecies' of Warbling Antbird Hypocnemis (cantator) striata.