Where Mankind and Nature Get Along

By EUGENE LINDEN

On the border between Brazil and Bolivia is a rare place where people profit from nature without destroying it. Called the Pantanal, it is a giant freshwater wetland that covers 140,000 sq km (54,000 sq. mi.). Unlike Brazil's other three great ecosystems -- the Atlantic forests, the Amazon and the plain called the Cerrado -- the Pantanal has not yet suffered grievous damage at the hand of man. Even more amazing, it retains some of the densest concentrations of wildlife in the Americas, despite the fact that settlers have worked cattle ranches in the area for more than 200 years.

On the pastures surrounding the ponds and marshes of the Pantanal, herds of capybaras, the world's largest rodents, munch on the native grasses. Hyacinth macaws, the world's largest parrots, nest in trees and crack palm seeds disgorged by cattle, which eat the fruit around the nut. According to Charles Munn, an ornithologist with Wildlife Conservation International, the cattle fill a niche formerly occupied by extinct giant sloths, which dined on palm seeds thousands of years before the first Portuguese settlers arrived. This happy coincidence is one reason why humans here get along with the 80 species of mammals, 230 kinds of fish, 650 different birds and 1,100 types of butterflies.

Also working in the Pantanal's favor is the inaccessibility of the central core of the huge floodplain. The enormous, uninhabited wetlands provide a refuge where animals can retreat from hunting and other human intrusions. Munn notes that the area has survived deforestation in large sections of its watershed and that the effects of industrialization in the surrounding states have so far been minimal. "If this glass is half empty," he says, surveying the wild diversity of wading birds, flycatchers and kingfishers feeding at the flooded edge of a pasture, "I can't imagine what it would look like full."

The region does face threats. According to Nilson de Barros, president of the Society for the Defense of the Pantanal, the rivers that feed into its marshes are being polluted by gold mining, deforestation and agriculture. To feed cattle herds, some ranchers are planting exotic grasses that threaten the delicate balance of the ecosystem. Wild-animal dealers are going after such items as rare birds and capybara skins. But De Barros believes the problems will be kept under control. He stresses that the Pantaneiros have traditionally respected the area's riches, and they are beginning to realize that their home has great potential for ecotourism.

As humanity paves over, logs and plows under forests and fields around the world, the crucial question for the biosphere is whether people can make peace with nature beyond the boundaries of the patchwork of parks and protected areas, which cover less than 1% of the globe. Through a combination of respect for the land and luck, the Pantaneiros have shown that this might be possible. At the headquarters of the huge Novo Miranda Ranch, manager Ito Menezes says, "The Pantanal has always vanquished human attempts to mess it up."