With the participation of people like you in our programs, we are mobilizing support for this conservation project and are making great connections with people who are anxious to learn about the natural world and care about protecting it, while sharing our enthusiasm about birds and biodiversity. Furthermore, in conducting our programs, we provide learning opportunities to locals students who can’t afford formal training, and we hire people from the local community for services we need for the groups. We want you to become our best testimony that humans can enjoy natural environments, support locals, learn about birds and promote real conservation with a minimum impact on our planet.

Research Programs

Our long-term goal is to document the fauna and flora of the reserve in order to be able to track changes in species composition and abundance as land use changes in the surrounding area. In connection with this goal, we hope to encourage studies undertaking behavioral observations on species represented in the reserve. We began this effort with two bird expeditions in September 2007 and 2008.

Bird Monitoring Program:



This project represents a unique opportunity to observe changes to the flora and fauna as urban development encroaches in the southwestern Amazon region. Our activities for the bird research involve continuing to mark individual birds seasonally in different parts of the reserve. We use mist nets (ground/canopy) to capture, color-band and release species. Bal-chatri traps will be used to capture raptors. To map the species present in different parts of the reserve, we spend any time not dedicated to banding to area searches. We use existing recordings as well as recording and playback equipment to identify calls unfamiliar to us. We give the opportunity to bird enthusiasts to participate in two bird expeditions/year and help us gathering data while enjoying opportunities of birdwatching with expert ornithologists Ursula Valdez and Dan Froehlich who co-direct this program. During each of these bird expeditions, we make sure that we trained at least one Peruvian student to continue the work in the long term, as well as invite local college students to gain skills in bird research techniques. For more details on this program contact Dan or Ursula .

Here are links to the upcoming research expeditions and programs:

Birds of the Peruvian Amazon - Fall 2009

Here are links to the previous research expeditions and programs:

Birds of the Peruvian Amazon - Spring 2009

Here are links to the reports from the previous expeditions:

Bird Expedition 2007
Bird Expedition 2008 (coming soon)

Here is the annotated bird checklist for CECCOT:

Annotated Bird Checklist for CECCOT

Tachycineta Swallow Project:

We recently established a collaboration with the Cornell University Project on “Golondrinas de las Americas” (Swallows of the Americas) coordinated by David Winkler (http://golondrinas.cornell.edu/default.html). We are initiating the explorations to establish a Tachycineta breeding biology project in surrounding areas of Puerto Maldonado. Volunteers interested to participate in this project should contact Ursula Valdez .

Sustainable Agriculture

This project is currently in an experimental phase entirely conducted by a group of local college students. Under the voluntary guidance of Jason Wells, a botanist working on Madre Dios for a few years now, the CECCOT youth group started a small-scale organic farm. Wendy Cueva and Rosmery Chacacanta are the leaders of this group, they and other 16 young men and women work week by week taking care of vegetable p-patches where they are growing different native and other long established vegetables and fruits. With the organic garden we aim to develop efficient strategies to growth food at low cost, lower our ecological footprint by producing food, on-site and to inspire neighbors and students to grow nutritious and fresh food at their homes. The organic garden is also use for demonstrations during the educational activities, and it produces food for visitors and their caretakers who enthusiastically monitor and document the weekly growth in their plots. General coordinator of this program is Ashley Basset, contact Ashley .

Academic and research training: We have hosted groups of college students in specific and organized courses. In 2007 we hosted a group of students in the II Field Ornithology and Conservation course sponsored by Amazon Conservation Association. In September of 2008 a group for students from the University of Washington worked in small research projects and conservation issues during the course “Biodiversity, Conservation and Sustainability”.

We welcome academic institutions, conservation organizations and individuals with serious commitment to student education and training under a low-impact conservation philosophy, to explore in the possibility to run field courses in our facilities. If interested contact Ursula .