Equally important, Monteverde is just one small site. The climate model suggests they might. Unfortunately, confirmation may be hard to come by, because few tropical ecologists will have Pounds's great luck in finding long-term weather data and population censuses at a single site. It may be the only case where these kinds of data sets overlap so much and give the opportunity to test this kind of hypothesis. It remains to be seen whether the changes in the cloud forests of Monteverde are a harbinger of further climate induced changes in ecosystems worldwide.
Black millipedes waltz on ferns below the vivid green canopy.
From this perspective, one of the most endangered ecosystems in the Western heniisphere seems an enclave far away from man-made Brazil. But just across the river bordering the 7,000-acre nature preserve, the air is pungent with the smell of burnt wood. Pinched by Brazil's financial crisis and deepening recession, nearby landowners are stepping up the illegal process of logging and burning forest for pasture and cropland. Now they are cutting into the sensitive buffer zones abutting pristine jungle. Last month, Fernando Gomes, mayor of the nearby town of Itabuna, illegally logged 124 acres just across from the preserve, federal authorities say.