This ecological corridor competes with other large biosphere reserves such as Yasuní and the Manu National Park in Peru.
A group of tourists in the Llanganates-Sangay park, in July 2022.
A forest located between the Andes and the Ecuadorian Amazon is home to 285 species of amphibians and reptiles. A figure that is equivalent to the natural wealth of biosphere reserves such as the Peruvian Manu National Park, which is 18 times larger, revealed a scientific report on July 7, 2023.
“We have this outstanding biodiversity, and it is in a small piece that is the Llanganates-Sangay corridor,” said researcher Mario Yánez, from the National Institute of Biodiversity (Inabio).
In this ecological corridor, of 92,145 hectares, 180 amphibians and 105 reptiles have been described to science.
That amount of amphibian species is almost a quarter of those registered in all of Ecuador, with some 650 varieties.
As the Llanganates-Sangay corridor is an area that has not been fully explored, the figures could increase.
“We continue to go out into the field and new species appear and the numbers change every year,” commented Juan Pablo Reyes, a scientist at the Ecominga Foundation, hopefully.
Considered a place of high endemism, the corridor crosses the Andean province of Tungurahua and the Amazonian provinces of Pastaza and Morona Santiago, connecting the Llanganates and Sangay national parks.
Endemic and endangered
As a guide to empower the population about the wealth of the area, the report -which includes information from almost 20 years of work and historical documentation- was released in the town of Baños.
The report was prepared by Alex Bentley along with Reyes, Yánez, Julio Carrión-Olmedo, Zane Libke and Jaime Culebras.
The corridor is a sort of “mountain archipelago,” which “has formed ideal microhabitats that favor the speciation of various endemic groups,” said Yánez.
He also explained that the elevations operate as geological barriers. Added to the different climates of the area results in great diversity.
In the corridor there are 36 endemic species of amphibians and three of reptiles. Some of them are in the endangered category on the list of the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The Yasuní Park has a “low incidence of endemism, while this very small area harbors with this high variability of ecosystems an explosion of unique species,” added Yánez.
In Yasuní, which, like Manu, was declared a biosphere reserve by Unesco, 271 species of amphibians and reptiles have been registered, fewer than those found in Llanganates-Sangay.
But climate change that causes variations in humidity patterns and rainfall are the latent threat to this natural jewel.
These modifications put amphibians and reptiles at risk because they cause “alterations in reproductive cycles” and in the food chain, Reyes said.
