According to the US Department of Agriculture honey bees alone pollinate 80% of all flowering plants. Their pollination of over 130 different species of vegetables and fruits means that these tiny creatures have a huge role in global food production. Their precipitous population decline should send shock waves throughout the world. That’s why every effort to protect … Read more
“Ha! Careful, they’ll try and go up your nose!” I turn and see Jospeh See, an ACEER conservation fellow, covered in bees. As they’re latching onto his hair and covering his macro camera, I can see he is beaming, perfectly in his element. We were in the midst of opening a tree trunk hive to … Read more
Well, the answer of insects in the garden as friend or foe is – both. There are millions of insect species throughout the world and scientists estimate that there are over 2.5 million insects in the Amazon Basin alone, many of which have not even been adequately described. Scientists working from ACEER supported canopy walkways … Read more
Birding in the Amazon is just a wonderful activity! It became one of my favorite activities when I had the opportunity to participate in a bird’s inventory in the Peruvian Amazon, as a field research assistant. I was amazed by the incredible diversity of birds we saw every morning in every study site. I could … Read more
by Vítor da Silva Our canoe hits the embankment of the river, and the 69-year old Maijuna elder, Agapo, pushes me up into the forest as he balances barefoot on his canoe. The forest is thick and there is no path anywhere around me. I wait for Agapo to tie his canoe, and with the … Read more
By Lindsay Schmittle, Gingerly Press My experience on the 2022 ACEER Artist Residency along the Sucusari River Basin deep in the Amazon Rainforest of Peru was definitely not your average artist residency experience. While this was my first true artist residency, I know that in most residencies, artists tend to spend the majority of their … Read more
Translated by Carolyn Keller and Brian Griffiths Is there a light more profound than that which illuminates the soul? I could see it in their looks, in the string of smiles from the conversations that brought us together in the wonder of knowing a world where the wildlife has free rein and is constantly transforming … Read more
Click through Slideshow Experiencing the Amazon rainforest was always something that I looked forward to. It was never a matter of if I would pursue research in the Amazon, but rather when I would begin. A frontier of biological diversity, the Amazon has excited me since I was young, and knowledge of its destruction set … Read more
The air in the kitchen shimmers with the heat, but Marina doesn’t sweat as she leans over her moledor to begin pounding yet another batch of boiled, steaming yuca waiting in the wooden batang stretched out before her. It’s clear that the gigantic tool of hardwood is heavy, but the weight doesn’t seem to bother … Read more
A jaguar is on the prowl on the outskirts of a local community deep in the Amazon rainforest. Its roars can be heard in the dead of night; its tracks surround the edges of the village. To some Indigenous communities, this may be a sign that a shaman from a rival village has transformed himself … Read more
