The reserve helps protect some of the headwaters of the Amazon basin. The collaboration with Jocotoco began on the road to Baeza when Craig Leon, founder and CEO of Cloud Forest Organics and Efraín from Jocotoco stopped to share maps and found they had the same passion and ideals. That encounter led to the partnership focused on expanding protection for Ecuador’s threatened cloud forests.
“The Jocotoco partnership has enabled us to maximize efficiency and focus. Together, we’ve expanded the reserve and cloud forest area under protection. Jocotoco supports our fundraising efforts and handles all back-office work, which lets us focus on conservation and research,” Craig explains.
Ongoing Research and Emerging Scientific Findings
CFO’s ongoing research is documenting the biodiversity of the Quijos cloud forest, a montane ecosystem on the eastern slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes. The team has collected 123 mushroom species to learn what role fungi play in the forest. Working with UDLA and international partners, researchers are conducting biochemical and morphological analyses and DNA sequencing on 18 mushroom species to better understand their characteristics and potential applications.
In a separate research effort, DNA analyses have identified three distinct species of porotón, a native Andean tree whose beans are used in cooking. With Wageningen University in the Netherlands, the team is studying the porotón’s potential antimicrobial properties and their possible relevance to combating hospital-associated infections.
Forest Regeneration in Practice
Restoring cloud forest on former cattle pasture presents significant challenges: invasive grasses, steep terrain, high humidity and freezing nighttime temperatures. CFO is testing planting and mulching techniques to help native trees survive, combining different plant species to encourage natural regeneration, and studying how underground fungi may support the forest’s recovery.
A Partnership for Conservation
Looking ahead, Craig identifies two central goals: “protecting and expanding this reserve, ideally connecting to an ecological corridor, and developing knowledge and experience to replicate Amazon cloud forest recovery at scale with community benefit.”
For Craig and Jocotoco, the urgency is clear: cloud forests are running out of clouds. As temperatures rise, clouds form higher up the mountains, faster than the forest can follow. That makes protecting the remaining cloud forests more urgent, as refuges for wildlife and sources of water for the Amazon basin. By supporting partners like CFO, Jocotoco extends the protection of these ecosystems beyond its own reserves.