Center for Amazon Community Ecology

Tumblr page for the Center for Amazon Community Ecology. Visit our home page at: www.amazonecology.org

[amazonecology]

Butterfly ornaments and Dora's family of artisans

Butterfly ornaments and Dora’s family of artisans

Chambira Association of Jenaro Herrera – Dora, Hilda and Doilith. Photo by Campbell Plowden/Center for Amazon Community Ecology

In the summer of 2007, the Center for Amazon Community Ecology began its second summer of field work researching the ecology and sustainable harvest of copal resin at a research station on the outskirts of Jenaro Herrera – a town of 5,000 people reached by a 12-hour…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Bringing artisans together and getting out of the way

Bringing artisans together and getting out of the way

Ampiyacu skill-sharing workshop. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

One of CACE’s most successful programs working with artisans in the Ampiyacu River region has been to organize skill-sharing workshopswhere five or six veteran artisans show other artisans how to make a new special kind of handicraft.  While these workshops have steadily increased the number of native artisans who know how to make…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Producing the first essential oil from rosewood trees at Brillo Nuevo

Producing the first essential oil from rosewood trees at Brillo Nuevo

Heliconia flower montage at Brillo Nuevo. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

Three years ago we began an exciting joint project with our partner Camino Verde by planting almost 1000 seedlings of rosewood trees in the Bora native community of Brillo Nuevo (see Global Giving Report #8). Our aim was to help families create a long-term sustainable source of income by carefully harvesting leaves and…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Listening to artisans in the Ampiyacu

Listening to artisans in the Ampiyacu

Angelina Torres and her family of artisans in the Bora community of Brillo Nuevo. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

The Center for Amazon Community Ecology aims to promote conservation, create sustainable livelihoods and build stronger communities in the Peruvian Amazon by helping native and mestizo artisans to develop and market innovative handicrafts and novel essential oils.

We began working with…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Building a better bug ornament

Building a better bug ornament

In 2007, I spent a month near Jenaro Herrera on the Ucayali River.  While I spent most of my time studying copal resin ecology at a research station, I also wanted to meet local artisans to see if CACE could help market any of their handicrafts.

Dora Tangoa with achiote fruit pods. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

One Saturday afternoon, I met Dora and her small group of fellow artisans at her home…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Miguel, Celestina and Rosewood Trees in Tamshiyacu – November 8, 2015

Miguel, Celestina and Rosewood Trees in Tamshiyacu – November 8, 2015

Juan Silvano harvesting rosewood leaves from Miguel’s tree. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

One highlight of my recent trip to Peru was spending a day with Miguel and Celestina – a couple who live in Tamshiyacu, a small town that is about an hour and a half by Iquitos by speed boat.  I first toured their farm a year ago with our local contact Juan who introduced us to a few families that had…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Breakthroughs with three artisan communities - October 15, 2015

Breakthroughs with three artisan communities – October 15, 2015

Bora artisan planting chambira seedling in 2013. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

We have had growing success helping artisans in the Ampiyacu develop and market innovative handicrafts, but our efforts to catalyze significant reforestation of chambira palms used to make woven crafts has been frustratingly slow.  While we have also promised to reinvest part of our craft sales in the US to support…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Ines – the laughing and feisty artisan from Brillo Nuevo - July 27, 2015

Ines – the laughing and feisty artisan from Brillo Nuevo – July 27, 2015

Ines lighting copal incense. Photo by Campbell Plowden/CACE

I first became aware of Ines during my second visit to the Bora native community of Brillo Nuevo in 2009 because she was enthusiastic about everything.  When we first tried to make incense candles from copal resin, she immediately got her hands blackened with the burnt sticky stuff and suggested they might look nice in the half-shells of…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Boost your support for Amazon conservation and communities

Boost your support for Amazon conservation and communities

Give your support for Amazon conservation and communities a boost today with a donation to the Center for Amazon Community Ecology. Donations made to CACE today after 9:00 am (EDT) through GlobalGiving at www.AmazonAlive.net will receive a 30% matching donation until matching funds run out.

If you live in Iquitos, Peru, please come meet CACE director Dr. Campbell Plowden and project manager Yully…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Exploring a new partnership with Maijuna native communities

Exploring a new partnership with Maijuna native communities

March 5, 2015

Maijuna boys in boat. Photo by Campbell Plowden/Center for Amazon Community Ecology

I just returned to Iquitos after a successful four day visit to the Maijuna native community of Nueva Vida in the Napo River region of the northern Peruvian Amazon. The main purpose of the trip was to meet their artisans and see if they wanted to work with CACE to develop and market several new models…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Hello Peru rainy season

Hello Peru rainy season

February 24 – Panama City airport

I’m excited to be leaving for Iquitos today. It will be in the middle of the rainy season when both tasty Amazon fruits and mosquitoes (with and without malaria) are abundant. I’m ready, though, because I get to spend a whole month away from the coldest winter I remember after living in central Pennsylvania for almost 20 years. The snow has been pretty, but…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Guisador (Curcuma longa) - the golden yellow dye plant

Guisador (Curcuma longa) – the golden yellow dye plant

Curcuma longais a herbaceous perennial plant in the ginger family (Zingiberaceae) whose rhizomes (roots) are used to dye fibers and foods yellow and to make a spice/medicine (turmeric). The plant originally came from India, but it is now widely used as well throughout the Amazon. Native and campesino artisans from Peru usually call this plant “guisador” and use it to transform white chambira palm…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Building relationships with GlobalGiving – a crowd-source platform with smarts and hearts

Building relationships with GlobalGiving – a crowd-source platform with smarts and hearts

The Center for Amazon Community Ecology began like many non-profit organizations – it had one person with few resources and a big dream about making the world a better place. I wanted to conserve the Amazon rainforest by helping native people to improve their livelihoods and communities by selling innovative non-timber forest products as alternatives to economic activities that damage the forest.…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Achiote - a dye plant for fiber, food and faces

Achiote – a dye plant for fiber, food and faces

Bixa orellanais the scientific name for a small tree whose spiny pods contain seeds covered with an oily red substance that is used around the world to dye food, fiber, and faces. While often known as annatto when used to give naturally white margarine a hint of yellow to make it look more like butter, people in Peru usually call it achiote. Below is a gallery of photos of achiote plants and its…

View On WordPress

[amazonecology]

Sisa (Arrabidaea spp.) plants and chambira fiber dyeing

View Post

[amazonecology]

Achira (Canna indica) - seed plant for Amazon handicrafts

Achira (Canna indica) is a lily family plant that many artisans in the Peruvian Amazon grow in…

View Post

[amazonecology]

Amazon Connections #8 Photos

Monitoring weevil trap on copal resin lump at Jenaro Herrera. Photo by Campbell Plowden/Center for…

View Post