University Of São Paulo Scientists Discover New Species In Isolated Mountains Of The Amazon
“Keep your ears open. As soon as the first frog sings, we leave; means that the rain has stopped”, announces Professor Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues, from the Institute of Biosciences (IB) at USP, while spying the storm through the window of the tent. Beside him, four other researchers await the serenade of amphibians lying on Brazilian Army camp beds, accompanied by two journalists and two military personnel. All dirty and tired, but eager to get back to work amidst the giant bromeliads and cloud forests outside.
We are at an altitude of 1,875 meters in the Serra do Imeri, an isolated mountain range in the extreme north of the Amazon. Heavy rain hits the camp almost every day, and the air humidity rarely drops below 90%. The floor of the tent is a great puddle of black, sticky mud, which clings to anything and anyone who dares to step on it. It’s practically impossible to keep clean, but nobody complains. This is a dream trip for any scientist who is interested in the biodiversity of the Amazon: a very rare opportunity to venture into a truly untouched and unknown nature, at the top of the largest tropical forest on the planet.
The idea for the trip came up in 2018, following a pioneering expedition to the almost neighboring Pico da Neblina, which resulted in several discoveries and documented, for the first time, the plants and animals that inhabit the highest mountain in Brazil (2,995 meters), in 2017. The region where we are now is less high, but more isolated, without any installed infrastructure or pre-established access road. As far as is known, no one has ever set foot there. The surrounding Yanomami communities were consulted before the expedition and not even they knew the highest parts of the mountain range.
The mission of the scientists at the top of the mountain is relatively simple: go through the widest possible variety of environments and collect the greatest possible diversity of plants and animals, to get an idea of what exists there. Simple to say, difficult to execute. Spending two weeks at the top of a mountain range, in the middle of the mud, exposed to the elements of nature, going up and down trails every day (and night) is no walk in the park.
“It was the most difficult expedition of my life”, Rodrigues would say, at the end of the adventure. At the age of 69, with an academic and life history the size of the Amazon, Rodrigues is the icon of the team and mentor of the expedition, carried out in partnership with the Brazilian Army and financed by the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). , through the Biota program. It was he who conceived the project and selected the team members, including specialists in reptiles and amphibians (herpetology), mammals (mastozoology), birds (ornithology), plants (botany) and parasites (parasitology). Fourteen researchers in all, from USP, the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), the Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro (JBRJ) and the National Center for Scientific Research of France (CNRS). O USP Journalaccompanied the entire expedition, which took place between the 2nd and 23rd of November.
From the beginning there was the expectation that many new species would be discovered, due to the biogeographical isolation of the region. Said and done: in 12 days of work in the field, the researchers collected 285 animals, of 41 species, of which 12 (30%), at least, are new to science (five amphibians, four lizards and three birds). It may seem like little, but it’s a lot. And that’s just what the researchers were able to immediately identify as new stuff. As the material is examined in detail in the laboratory, it is very likely that other novelties will appear, both from a genetic and morphological point of view.
“Where else do you go out to collect and come back from the field every day with a new species in hand? It’s incredible here”, exclaims Rodrigues. “We are filling a blank page in the history of Brazilian biodiversity.”
“Here is a different Amazon. There are fewer animals and less diversity, but everything we find is special”, says ornithologist Luís Fábio Silveira, from USP’s Zoology Museum (MZ), with his eyes turned upwards and a pair of binoculars in his hand, always attentive the movement of birds in the forest canopy. Aided by biologist Igor Alvarenga, he collected 21 species of birds on the expedition, of which three, at least, are new to science — in addition to other outstanding records, such as a toucan-green ( Aulacorhynchus whitelianus ), never before captured in Brazil . Another 46 species had their occurrence recorded through songs or sightings.
As important as the number of new species, according to the researchers, is the fact that a large part of the plants and animals collected on the expedition seem to be exclusive (or endemic, in technical language) to these mountain formations in northern Amazonia, which include Pico da Neblina, Mount Roraima and other tabular massifs (called tepuis), which spread across northern Brazil, southern Venezuela and western Guyana. In other words, they are species that only exist on top of the mountains and plateaus of this region, known as Pantepui.
Located on the border between Brazil and Venezuela, Serra do Imeri is located in the extreme south of this mountainous region, protected within Brazilian territory by a double layer of protected areas: the Yanomami Indigenous Land and the Pico da Neblina National Park ( map above ).
“The level of endemism here is very high. That’s the big difference”, explains professor Taran Grant, also from IB-USP, a specialist in amphibians. As a comparison, before heading to the mountains, the researchers spent a night collecting reptiles and amphibians around the Santa Isabel do Rio Negro airport, 90 kilometers (km) south of Serra do Imeri, which the Army used as a support base. for shipment. In three hours of quiet work, without much effort, they collected 45 animals of 20 different species. In Serra do Imeri, it took five days of intense work to collect the same number of animals, using dozens of traps and dozens of hours of active search in nature. In the end, they returned home with 160 animals of at least 12 species.
Biologist Leandro Moraes, a doctoral candidate at the USP Institute of Biosciences, prepares a tray with some of the amphibians and reptiles collected on the expedition to Serra do Imeri – Photo Herton Escobar/USP Images
The fundamental difference, as noted by Grant, is that none of the 20 species collected in Santa Isabel do Rio Negro were new, while almost all of the 12 species collected in Serra do Imeri are new (four lizards and five amphibians, at least), in addition to that they are all endemic to the tepuis region, according to Rodrigues.
In addition to the two professors, the herpetology team consisted of biologists Agustín Camacho, Antoine Fouquet, José Mario Ghellere, Leandro Moraes and Renato Recoder. No snake was found on the expedition, despite much searching.
In the case of mammals, the number of specimens collected was even high, but with a relatively small diversity of species. Of a total of 69 animals captured, 55 were from just three species of mice — none of them new, but all of them endemic to the tepuis, according to Professor Alexandre Percequillo, from the Luiz de Queiroz School of Agriculture (Esalq) at USP, in Piracicaba , who made up the mastozoology team with professor Ana Paula Carmignotto, from UFSCar. The same collection effort in the “lower Amazon”, according to them, would have produced the opposite result, with a much greater number of species, but fewer individuals collected from each of them.
The only larger animals registered on the expedition were tapirs and two species of monkey (capuchin and howler monkey), sighted in the lower parts of the mountain range. Due to the difficulties imposed by the terrain, the researchers’ work was restricted to a range of 1,700 to 2,000 meters (m) in altitude.
Despite being physically connected with the forests below them, these mountain formations harbor environments that are highly differentiated from the rest of the Amazon. They are like islands that rise above an ocean of forest, with their own environmental conditions and little connectivity between them — conditions that favor biogeographic isolation and, consequently, the evolution of their own biodiversity, exclusive to these places. Altitude is a determining factor: the higher the elevation, the lower the temperature and, consequently, the lower the number and diversity of living beings capable of surviving there.
As with oceanic islands, therefore, it is to be expected that these forested mountains have a more restricted and highly endemic biodiversity, compared to the rest of the Amazon. Several of the species collected in Serra do Imeri are similar — but not necessarily identical — to those that the researchers collected a few years ago at Pico da Neblina, in an expedition very similar to the current one, or that were already known from other tepuis, but that had never been discovered before. collected in Brazil.
According to the researchers, these similarities suggest that Serra do Imeri was once a tepui as well, although it no longer has that characteristic shape. The tabletop, so to speak, has been eroded away, except for a few harder granite monoliths that now jut from its escarpments like geological relics of a distant past—preserved both in the minerals of the rocks and in the DNA of the endemic species that survive there, and which will now be studied by scientists.
Identifying these species is just the first step. Ultimately, what the researchers seek is precisely to understand how each one of them is collectively inserted in a historical context of the evolution of the biodiversity of the Amazon, including its relationships in time and space with the biodiversity of the Andes, the Atlantic Forest and other biomes of the Amazon. South America.
In the case of plants, the endemic biodiversity of these mountains can be a key piece for understanding the origins of the Amazonian and South American flora as a whole, according to Professor Lúcia Lohmann, from the Department of Botany at IB-USP. “We believe that several lineages of plants had their origin here, in this higher region of the Amazon; then they descended and occupied the lower regions, diversifying along the way”, she reports. “Our proposal is to try to understand these origins, how this biota so diverse that today is distributed throughout South America emerged. The species that are up here are critical to that.”
Lohmann and colleague Rafaela Forzza, from the JBRJ, collected samples of 220 species of plants, of the most diverse types and sizes, from tiny orchids to palm trees several meters long. More specifically: six specimens of each species, totaling 1,320 samples, to be distributed among different herbaria and shared with specialists for identification.
Lohmann estimates that 10% of these species could be new, in addition to other important records. The “giant” bromeliads that surround our camp, for example, were only known from another mountain range, on the border of Roraima and Venezuela (Serra Parima), based on a collection made more than half a century ago (in 1969): Brocchinia hechtioides .Another endemic species of Pantepui. The biggest ones reach almost two meters in height.
Another line of research, led by Camacho, seeks to map the vulnerability of these endemic animals to global warming. Using a simple apparatus, which he built himself (and without imposing any suffering on the animals), the researcher measures the temperature limit at which each species of reptile and amphibian is physiologically adapted to survive — called the maximum voluntary temperature, or TVM. The idea is to know at which point on the thermometer global warming becomes a threat to them, to the point of putting their populations at risk.
“These species that live on the tops of mountains are especially vulnerable to climate warming”, points out the Spanish biologist, doctor and post-doctorate in zoology from the IB-USP. Those who live further down may climb the mountain in search of milder climates, as the planet’s temperature increases; but those who already live at the top do not. “This option of going upstairs to escape does not exist for them.” Even living within a protected area, therefore, these species may have their existence cornered by climate change.
The start of the expedition was scheduled for November 5, but had to be postponed by two days due to meteorological issues. At 7:00 am on November 7th, half of the team boarded a large Jaguar helicopter from the Brazilian Army for a 25-minute flight from Santa Isabel do Rio Negro to Serra do Imeri. The flight went without any problems, but the rest of the team had to wait another 24 hours to make the same journey, because as soon as we landed the clouds closed over the mountain and didn’t open again until the end of the day. The helicopter even took off, but had to turn around a few minutes later, much to everyone’s frustration.
There is no other way to get there other than by air. In the months leading up to the expedition, the Army made several attempts to establish a land or river access route to the site, but without success. Luckily they found a small area, more or less flat, where it was possible to land the helicopter; otherwise even that would not have been possible. “If the professor and his team wanted a really isolated place ( for research ), they got it”, said the head of the Amazon Military Command (CMA), General Achilles Furlan Neto, upon receiving us at the Army headquarters in Manaus, in the early November.
Unlike Pico da Neblina, where there is a well-established Yanomami and military presence, this southern portion of the Serra do Imeri is a veritable terra incognita. In the search for a way to the top, Army scouts — under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Márcio Weber de Menezes, from the 3rd Infantry Battalion of the Jungle (3rd BIS) — consulted the Yanomami communities in the region, who reported no climb the mountain. “If neither the Army nor the indigenous people went there, I don’t think anyone went”, concluded General Furlan.
The expedition was authorized by the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio), responsible for managing the national park and collecting licenses, and by the National Indian Foundation (Funai), in consultation with associations representing the Yanomami ethnic group in the region.
The expedition’s base was set up in the middle of a bromeliad, with five large Canadian-type tents, organized by purpose: kitchen, laboratory, infirmary and dormitories. Add it all up: seven tons of infrastructure, equipment and supplies, which required seven helicopter flights to get there. A team of 21 soldiers remained in place to operate the camp and support the researchers’ work on the mountain, led by Captain Jefferson Fagundes, from the 3rd BIS. “It would be impossible to carry out this expedition without the support of the Army”, Rodrigues pointed out on several occasions.
The view from the camp was impressive. Right in front of us was the Pico do Imeri, almost 2,400 meters high, crowned by a gigantic pyramidal monolith, adorned by carpets of vegetation that seem to flow down its slopes like an icing on a cake. Looking to the left, in the northwest direction, several mountain escarpments lined up one after the other, with the outline of Pico da Neblina visible on the distant horizon. To the right, looking southeast, more mountains sprawled over a green plain that stretched as far as the eye could see, in the direction of the Rio Negro. Even for those used to walking through the Amazon, it was an out-of-the-ordinary landscape.
Access to the surrounding forests was via three main trails, which the researchers traversed daily to carry out their collections. The distances weren’t long, but the terrain was difficult: steep, rough, and muddy. At several points it was necessary to use ropes to move around safely. There was no lack of bruises and scratches distributed throughout the expedition; But fortunately, no one was seriously injured. Lohmann even broke six ribs in a fall, but was attended to by the Army doctor at the camp and had no major complications.
The collection techniques are different for each group, but all involve a combination of the use of traps and an active search in nature — when researchers go out looking for animals in the middle of the forest. For reptiles and amphibians, for example, the most classic traps are the pitfall type , which are nothing more than buckets buried in the ground, into which the animals fall and cannot get out. Three of the four new species of lizard from Serra do Imeri had individuals collected in this way, while the new frogs and tree frogs were all found through active search.
Each specimen collected receives a “field number”, which starts to function as an ID for that animal, accompanied by notes on where, how and when it was captured.
Another standard procedure introduced in this expedition was the collection of blood samples from captured animals, for the detection of trypanosomatids — a family of protozoa that includes Trypanosoma cruzi , which causes Chagas disease, and Trypanosoma brucei , which causes sleeping sickness. Out of a total of 240 samples, 14 had tested positive for trypanosome by the time this report was published, taken from mammals, birds and amphibians.
As in the case of their hosts, it is virtually certain that many of these parasites represent new species, according to researcher Bruno Fermino, a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Parasitology at the Institute of Biomedical Sciences (ICB) at USP, responsible for collecting and analyzing the samples. . Knowledge of this biodiversity of wild parasites is of national health importance, as these trypanosomes may infect farm animals (such as chickens) and even human beings in the future, as man advances through the forest. “Then we have no idea what disease they could cause”, warns Fermino.
The expedition ended on November 18, two days ahead of schedule—supplies were running low, the weather was unpredictable, and the Army saw fit to break camp and get everyone safely off the mountain, taking advantage of a window of clear weather. Many years of research will still be needed to analyze and describe all the material that was brought back, but nobody has any doubts that the expedition was a success.
“Absolute success”, celebrates Rodrigues. “We gained a lot from this expedition.” Not only from the point of view of scientific knowledge, he says, but also from the strengthening of national sovereignty. For the first time, joining what was collected in Imeri and Pico da Neblina, Brazil has its own biological material and “intellectual independence” to research the biodiversity of these highlands of the Amazon, which until now was almost exclusively the domain of other countries . “This intellectual independence gives us sovereignty, and that is very important”, concludes Rodrigues.
All the material collected in the expedition was deposited in the USP IB and MZ collections. In the case of botany, duplicates of all the plants will also be sent to the herbaria of the Botanical Garden in Rio de Janeiro and the National Institute for Research in the Amazon (Inpa), in Manaus.