La Tierra del Jaguar

The mission of La Tierra del Jaguar is to teach regenerative skills and empower people to coexist with nature in places inhabited by jaguars. We work hand-in-hand with communities to achieve a cultural shift so that wildlife, especially jaguars, are respected rather than reviled. We promote the benefits of biodiversity, landscape restoration, regenerative agriculture, permaculture, crop diversity, rotational grazing, and alternative income streams.

Why La Tierra del Jaguar?
Habitat loss through ecosystem conversion and degradation are the main threats to biodiversity around the world, the land of the jaguar is no exception. With 80 percent of land in Sonora held by private ranches, the jaguars home is now a patchwork of agricultural fields, overgrazed cattle ranches and human settlements. Communities in the jaguar's northern range rely heavily on ranching and farming for income. The loss of cattle to predation, jaguar or otherwise, can have a devastating impact on a person's ability to provide for themselves or their family. We realized the long-term strategy to save the jaguar is to work with local residents to accept and live peaceably with these cats.

La Tierra del Jaguar was founded to meet the needs of communities while simultaneously improving habitat for jaguars and other wildlife. We promote the benefits of biodiversity, landscape restoration, regenerative agriculture, permaculture, crop diversity, rotational grazing, and alternative income streams. We educate people on implementing changes needed to heal the land after centuries of overgrazing. Using the strategies outlined below, we can create abundance for humans, jaguars and all of nature.

•Regenerative agriculture techniques- strengthen species diversity, improve water quality, and reduce human-jaguar conflict.
•Landscape restoration- increases the security and connectivity of jaguar habitat that has been degraded over centuries of extractive land use.
•Economic opportunities- stimulate sustainable development and the regenerative economy as alternatives to ranching and mining.
•Natural building- helps people design and construct energy-efficient homes with a low-carbon footprint.

Current Projects:
La Tierra is proud to announce the launch of our Aliados de la Naturaleza program. Through this initiative, we collaborate with a diverse group of producers to restore land using low-tech, process-based techniques and planting agave angustifolia, a native plant threatened by unsustainable harvest from the wild. By strategically selecting restoration sites and cultivating agave throughout the Río Sahuaripa watershed, we aim to create critical feeding sites for the lesser long-nosed bat, another threatened species in the region.

What do the jaguar, lesser long-nosed bat, and agave all have in common? Their survival hinges upon our ability to reverse habitat degradation and raise awareness of their importance to the ecosystems. The Aliados program addresses systemic issues leading to environmental destruction through a multifaceted approach involving landowner education, on-the-ground restoration, and community empowerment, striving to protect the diverse communities and wildlife that call this region home.

Along with workshops for adults, La Tierra provides youth environmental education to engage kids in outdoor activities and develop their understanding and appreciation of the environment. We help grow and support tomorrows conservation leaders.

Our Team:
We are a team of change-makers who believe that effective conservation can not be achieved without involving the people and meeting their needs. We are passionate about jaguar conservation, habitat restoration and teaching regenerative practices to improve the lives of humans and wildlife.

How you can help:
Education is critical to creating resilient communities that can reverse the effects of land degradation and climate change while improving ecosystem health, quality of life, and financial stability. We seek to educate people on implementing changes to heal the taxed landscape and we are creating a demonstration site so they can experience and be inspired by landscape restoration and regenerative agriculture firsthand. Restoration projects take time and do not have immediate rewards, requiring a long-range view that might be hard for ranchers to envision when pitted against immediate, day-to-day needs. By inviting the community to see and experience regenerative practices in action we increase understanding of the benefits.

La Tierra del Jaguar has purchased 25 acres on the Rio Sahuaripa in Santo Tomas, just a few minutes from the larger town of Sahuaripa, Sonora. We are in the process of constructing a solar powered earthbag classroom and workshop with the help of local craftspeople. Finishing this structure is essential to providing workshops, classes and economic opportunities to the community...