Esteros del Ibera and Rincon del Socorro

On December 14^th we arrived at the Rincon del Socorro, another beautiful property owned by the Tompkins. This beautiful Estancia shares a space with some of the most stunning and well-preserved wetland habitat in the world. We immediately fell in love with he wild space, and wished we could have stayed for more time! The staff was very informative and a lot of fun, and jobs and opportunities here were almost as diverse as the habitat around us.

Some history: 3.2 million acres in the upper basin of the Corriente River, the Esteros del Ibera Nature Reserve protects one of the largest freshwater wetlands in Argentina. Inside the reserve is Ibera Provincial Park, covering 1.2 million acres. This area protects species of wildlife that have been previously targeted by hunters. This conservation area is reinforced with 370,000 acres of private land purchased by The Conservation Land Trust (CLT), and fully protects the natural wonders inside. Rincon del Socorro is privately owned, but allows visitors to stay at the hostel. This giant reserve is home to more than 500 vertebrate species and more than 4,000 native plant species.

Rincon del Socorro

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The most rewarding and eye-opening portions of our stay on the Ibera were the excursions we did into the marshland. Even just outside of the Estancia compound we immediately encountered vibrant and profuse amounts of wildlife all intermingling together in a very complete and balanced food web. On our first nature walk we saw hundreds of Capybara rodents hopping into mud holes, chewing grass, carrying their young on their hairy backs, and generally effecting a very lazy and content attitude. In the sky, trees, and brush we saw birds of every shape, size, color, and biological purpose; some were huge birds of prey, while others darted around eating mosquitoes and bugs, but most were on branches or reeds happily chirping to the gawking gringos walking by. Foxes darted into bushes after giving us curious looks over their shoulders, and viscachas (small rodents – a fatter version of a prairie dog) hopped around on their mounded communities chattering away with squeaks and grunts. Perhaps the most impressive site was the Marsh Deer, which was about the size of an elk and had a rack of horns to match. Walking back to the compound, we encountered an armadillo digging his burrow right in the middle of the road, and it actually looked offended about our interruption! The flora and fauna is in a pristine balance here, a perfection and unity of nature that neither of us have seen for quite a long time.

The fragility of this beautiful habitat was made all the more apparent when looking over the fence at the heavyset hooved beasts munching and compacting the ground into a monotonous wasteland. Much like the western United States, the ubiquitous cow is turning beautiful habitat into an inhospitable moonscape. It was depressing to think how many wild animals were being displaced and sacrificed for the abrasive herbivore. Looking at the two sides of the fence we were both stunned by how much of an affect poor land management has on the environment. Though Ivan started to go into one of his introspective angry activist moods about how much he hates cows, he was shown portions of land bought by CLT (Conservation Land Trust – part of the Tompkins conservation movement) that has had the cows removed and is being allowed the chance to heal itself. The land was making a remarkable recovery and gave hope that even abusive cattle ranching wouldn’t mar the landscape forever. CLT still has a portion of land with cattle, which they are using for a ‘control’ in an experiment to compare the affects of continued cattle raising versus damaged land left alone. However, even more exciting than land given a chance to recover, was being shown a future restoration site were the earth will be pushed back into its natural contours and restored with native plants.

Another restorative activity we did was to shadow Jamil, a wildlife biologist working on his PhD. His goal is to reintroduce the Giant Anteater back into the Ibera marsh, where it has been absent for quite some time. We walked through several squishy areas with a radio sensor trying to find the elusive ant vacuum, however it was found a day later in a much farther location (a good thing too since there is a better chance of it mating there!). Jamil uses several remote cameras to monitor their activity, radio collars, and even tranquilizer guns to sedate the animal for tests. We had an eventful afternoon practicing with the tranq-gun, which is amazingly accurate and adjustable.

Out in the field enjoying the sunshine as we track for the Anteaters

Ivan practicing his skills with a tranquilizer gun for the next day's adventure to put a tracking collar around a baby Anteater

Kristin had the best shot/aim when practicing with the blow-dart tranquilizer!! Kristin mastered this skill of having large amounts of air in ones lungs and blowing out quickly from her 9 years of playing the clarinet! :)

Another fantastic outing was spending the day with Sebastian, who is in charge of exotic specie removal (ie: weeds, pigs, axis deer, water buffalo, and other invasive species), as well as control burns and plant restorations. He took us to the Laguna Ibera, a large lake inundated with amazing wildlife. A local at one of the CLT campsites took us around in a small boat to get up-close and personal with alligators, birds, fish, capybaras, deer, and many other kinds of flora and fauna. We got to see 2 species of alligator, which were sunning themselves with one sneaky eye open for potential prey. After an amazing tour of the Laguna, we headed down the road to the visitors center to see some informative exhibits about the riparian habitat, as well as a short nature trail that had some howler monkeys (didn’t see any though…). It was great talking with Sebastian and hearing about the different and wide-ranging challenges of managing thousands of hectares of land. He was really impressed with Kristin’s soil science degree, and Ivan’s dabbling in restoration ecology. He has promised to visit us in the states, and may even stay for a while to learn English and more on restoration management.

Today we are leaving this beautiful Estanica and heading back to Mercedes to begin our journey into Uruguay where we plan on spending Christmas and the next 10 or so days.