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Rupununi: Rediscovering a Lost World

text and photographs by Graham Watkins

There is a magnificent rift valley in central Guyana called the Takutu Basin. The Pakaraima, Iwokrama and Makarapan Mountains bound the northern rim of the valley and the Kanuku Mountains bound the southern rim. The Makushi – the main indigenous group of the North Rupununi – know this area between these mountains and from the Essequibo River in the east to the Takutu and Ireng Rivers in the west, as Pîyakîîta. This term means “place of landings”, referring to the ease of access provided from the river to the area; explorers during the 19^th Century called the area “Macoushia.”

The Takutu Basin is the northern part of the Rupununi or Raponani in Makushi. The name probably derives from the Makushi word “rapon” for the Black-bellied Whistling-duck (Dendrocygna autumnalis) which is found along the river. A second interpretation is that the name came from the Wapisiana (the main indigenous group of the South Rupununi) word for the Hog Plum (Spondias mombin), which is “rup” or “zrupan.” This naming dichotomy reflects the partition of the Rupununi into north and south with the north being, for the most part, Makushi and the south chiefly Wapisiana.

The Rupununi is one of the last great wilderness areas in the world. Visiting the Rupununi is like visiting the Galapagos, Serengeti, Manu, Yasuni, the Everglades, Doñana, Okavango, Yellowstone, or Maasai Mara. Nevertheless, the Rupununi lacks the international name recognition of these legendary parks. In the early 1800s, at his first sight of the Surama savanna, Charles Waterton referred to the Rupununi in the following terms “the finest park that England boasts falls far short of this delightful scene.” During the mid 20^th Century, the Rupununi became well known for its species richness and endangered species.

Few people have written about the Rupununi in the last 30 years despite a long and rich literary and film history. The Rupununi, particularly the Kanuku Mountains and Karanambu, has attracted many writers, naturalists and filmmakers. However, since the films and books of Sir David Attenborough, Gerald Durrell, Michael Swan, Nick Gordon, and Jan Lindblad there has been relatively little in the public domain about the Rupununi.

The Rupununi is a biological treasure trove. The Rupununi is a unique collection of ecosystems that is home to over 1,400 species of vertebrates. This level of species richness is comparable with western Amazonia, the most diverse place in the world. The diversity results from the mixing of Amazonian and Guiana Shield faunas, substantial habitat diversity, and the seasonal 7 to 10 m rising and falling of water levels, which opens huge areas for fish spawning and feeding. We do not know how many species of fish we will find in the wetlands of the Rupununi; but, so far, we have a list of 410 species. Scientists from the Royal Ontario Museum have also found more than 110 species of bats in the area, about 10% of all the species of bats in the world. The northern Rupununi is also home to healthy populations of endangered species like the Giant River Otter (Pteronura brasiliensis), Jaguar (Panthera onca), Giant River Turtle (Podocnemis expansa), Black Caiman (Melanosuchus niger), Giant Anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla), Harpy Eagle (Harpia harpyja), and Arapaima (Arapaima gigas).

The geology of the Rupununi is ancient and consequently complex. Much of the habitat diversity of the area arises because of its Precambrian geological history, which dates back to the origin of the Earth. In the northern Rupununi, there are huge flat savannas, which are the basin of a rift valley formed when South America and Africa were still connected. On either side of this valley, the Pakaraima and Kanuku Mountains provide some of the most beautiful vistas in Guyana. The fragmented geology is the base for many different habitat types within a small area including seasonally flooded savannas and forests, oxbow and depression lakes, large rivers and small mountain streams, rainforests, savannas, and mountains over 1,000 metres.

People have been part of this landscape for over 7,000 years. Anthropologists have found Paleo-Indian carved petroglyphs, dated to over 7,000 years old, along rivers and mountain trails throughout the Rupununi. Well over 400 years ago, the Makushi came to the northern Rupununi probably from what is today Brazil and Venezuela. The Makushi continue to live here and rely on the fish, wildlife, and forest resources of the area. The northern Rupununi and the Rio Branco savannas and forests are the homeland of the Makushi.

The Rupununi has not escaped the attention of the world. Sir Walter Ralegh never visited the Rupununi but he waxed lyrical about it being the location of the famed “El Dorado.” His second-in-command, Lawrence Keymis, even determined from Amerindian accounts how to arrive at the great white lake on whose shores was El Dorado. Later explorers and adventurers including Charles Waterton and Robert Schomburgk visited this great lake, which proved to be the flooded northern Rupununi savannas near what today people call Lake Amucu, but they did not find El Dorado.

From the 1700s, writers, explorers, and naturalists travelled to the Rupununi. Evelyn Waugh spent some time lost in the savannas and wrote an eloquent travelogue on the area to add to those of the Schomburgk brothers, Charles Waterton, Everard Im Thurn, and Charles Barrington Brown. David Attenborough and Gerald Durrell made their own literary contributions with accounts of animal collecting trips in the area in the company of the local naturalist Tiny McTurk. Today, the Rupununi is once again capturing the interest of biologists and journalists; it is beginning to rise again in international importance.

That their home is remarkable and worthy of conservation is not a new idea to those that live in the Rupununi. The idea has gained traction over the last 20 years with the support of the North Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB), Conservation International, the Iwokrama International Centre for Rain Forest Conservation and Development, and the World Wide Fund for Nature. Some of the past economic activities have damaged the biodiversity of the area and some of the proposed activities including gold mining, petroleum extraction, and large-scale agriculture pose new threats.

Guyana is a developing country that needs investment and economic growth to build opportunities for Guyanese. Large-scale agriculture, mining, and petroleum are a pathway to development, a pathway that many nations have followed. However, any national development strategy should recognize the special status of the biodiversity of the Rupununi and require effective management of the impacts arising from large-scale development. There is considerable potential for a sustainable economy in the Rupununi through developing payments for ecosystem services and conservation-linked businesses such as ecotourism. Doing so would help the Rupununi contribute more than ever before to national development.

The Rupununi represents considerable comparative advantage for Guyana. As the world struggles to “re-wild” lost large predators and herbivores or to conserve remnants of biodiversity,

Guyana has an extraordinary and unique ecosystem, where small investments can ensure its long-term conservation and support sustainable human development. This does not mean that the Government of Guyana should not permit gold mining, large-scale agriculture, or petroleum extraction in the Rupununi; it does mean that extreme care is required to minimize impacts for what, ultimately, is one of Guyana’s main assets in a world rapidly losing both biodiversity and large wild animals.

International perspectives of Guyana are slowly changing. Guyana is a country that fascinated Sir Walter Ralegh, Sir David Attenborough, and Gerald Durrell and a place that biologists considered the gateway to South American wildlife. Today, the evolving national development strategy, linked to global climate change mitigation, places Guyana back on the world stage. Global initiatives such as “Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation” (REDD and REDD+) can play an important role in the sustainable future of Guyana and the Rupununi and once again bring Guyana to international audiences as a bastion and model for conservation and sustainable development.

For more information on the Rupununi, please visit www.rupununi.org and buy the October 2010 release book “Rupununi, Rediscovering a Lost World” by Graham Watkins, Pete Oxford and Renee Bish.