The Atlantic Rainforest

"For each hundred trees of times long gone, only five remain to bear witness and to accuse
the centuries-old, relentless executioner.
Only five, no more: the ghosts of the proud primeval forest."
(Carlos Drummond de Andrade)

One of the world's top five biodiversity hotspots, the Atlantic Rainforest is a place of extraordinary beauty and a treasure house of biodiversity. Tragically, much of its immense variety of flora and fauna is severely endangered by habitat loss, and the Wooly Spíder Monkey, symbol of the forest, is the most severely threatened of all.

To give you an idea of the variety of species, the state of Minas Gerais alone (which is slightly smaller than Texas,) contains 750 different bird species, only 60 fewer than are found in the whole of North America.

The forest also shelters a large number of endemic plant species - 54% of the trees, 64% of the palms and 74% of the bromeliads are found nowhere else on earth. Among the fauna, 80% of the primates are endemic, as are 40% of all mammals, butterflies, reptiles, amphibians and birds.

This enormous biological richness is severely threatened. Figures published in 2003 by IBAMA, the Brazilian Environmental Protection Institute, show a very high proportion of all endangered species in the country are found in the Atlantic Rainforest. Of Brazil's 69 severely endangered mammals 38 come from the Atlantic Rainforest, as do 18 of the 160 endangered birds and 13 of the 20 endangered reptile species. There are 21 species and subspecies of monkeys found in the Atlantic Rainforest, of which 14 are endangered, 13 are endemic and several are literally on the brink of extinction. The world's largest population of the Wooly Spider Monkey, (the most endangered Neotropical primate) is found in the forests of the Serra do Brigadeiro near Iracambi.

We hear a lot about the destruction ot the Amazon Rainforest but the  fact is that plight of the Atlantic Rainforest is far more critical. 20% of the Amazon forest has gone, but 93% of the Atlantic Rainforest has vanished, together with the species that used to live there.

It is generally believed that tropical forests restore their full biodiversity in 500 years. Yet, at today's rate, the Atlantic Rainforest does not have 500 years. The rate of destruction and forest clearance is still highly alarming. In 1988 the Atlantic Rainforest was declared a national heritage and the government prohibited any further cutting or clearance. But the destruction continues.

In the Serra do Brigadeiro the main reason for forest clearing has historically been to plant coffee. But this proves to be a poor investment. Rainforest soils are fragile, and forests rely on complex relationships between the trees and plants and tiny micro-organisms or fungi from which they can extract the minerals and nutrients they need to grow. When the forest is cleared the soils rapidly lose their residual fertility, crop yields decline, farmers convert the fields to pasture which is massively overgrazed, topsoil washes away, erosion damage sets in and farmers are forced to clear more land in order to feed their families. 

Forest Fragmentation

This process of deforestation has left the Atlantic Rainforest in Minas Gerais severely fragmented. As you fly over the state, you'll see a mosaic of forest patches, not the vast swathe of forest that you'd see in the Amazon. The 15,000 ha Serra do Brigadeiro State Park, in whose buffer zone we live, is one of the largest and most important surviving forest areas in the state. Here is a [satellite image] of forest fragments near Iracambi; the park is the larger patch of dark green on the left.

From the theory of island biogeography we know that the smaller the fragment of forest, the fewer species it will be able to sustain, and that as the fragments get smaller, species loss increases. Even though some scientists do not agree that there is a universal size/species relationship, we can assume that this rule applies to the relatively homogeneous forest fragments of southeastern Minas Gerais.

The important consequence of this for Iracambi is that we must do what we can to ensure that the process of fragmentation is halted and reversed. Our first priority in biodiversity conservation is preventing habitat loss and increasing fragment size through planting forest corridors, while ensuring that they make a useful addition to the farm economy.