Zone Description
Located in the Province of: Esmeraldas
Established: October 26, 1995
Resolution: Resolution No. 001 DE (052-A-DE)
Area: 51,300 hectares - 126,760.56 acres
Altitude Range: 0 to 35 meters above sea level
Life Zones: bhT, mangrove
Description of the Region
The mangrove forest has a relatively low species diversity. The low diversity helps
to form a large variety of aquatic communities, protecting the land from sea erosion
and recycling nutrients.
The mangrove has been important to men and women since ancient times; they have found
a use for almost every part of the tree. During the 1940s and 1950s, the mangrove was
primarily used to obtain tannin for the tannery industry. This practice devastated the
mangrove forests until 1975, when the extraction of tannin from the tree bark became
illegal. During the 1960s, the mangrove wood was exploited by coastal sawmills as a
salt-water resistant material for house construction.
These extraction activities were some what controlled by the ecosystem, but a new threat
to mangrove areas has recently developed as a result of the burgeoning shrimp.
The construction of shrimp pools is destroying the mangrove forests causing ecological
devastation on a number of levels. Water contamination from chemical residues and the
destruction of several habitats cause the death of many aquatic species. Mangrove
deforestation is a direct cause of the decrease in shellfish, fish and crab populations,
which leads to socio-economic problems for the inhabitants who depend on these resources.
|
|
Tipical Fern
|
| |
River in the Reserve
|
| |
Giant tree
|
| |
Endemic Frog
|
| |
Endemic Papillon
|
| |
Beach landscape
|
| |
One can reach close to the reserve with the train
|
|