On one Saturday in August 2023, news of a jaguar (Panthera onca) death shook the small streets of the Amazonian town of Ixiamas in Bolivia. It was all community members were talking about, after having found the animal’s carcass on the side of a dirt road leading to the community of Santa Fe. The jaguar’s head was missing, leading to one hypothesis: that the jaguar had been killed for its fangs. A criminal case was opened, but ultimately nothing happened. Ixiamas is located 866 kilometers (538 miles) from the city of La Paz, the entire municipality is Amazonian and 60% of its territory has been declared a protected area. At 3.7 million hectares (9.1 million acres), Ixiamas is the second-largest municipality in Bolivia, and is home to the Lower Madidi Municipal Conservation and Management Area (AMCM-BM by its Spanish acronym), which, together with Madidi National Park, is the largest jaguar habitat in the country, according to Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) Bolivia. In Ixiamas’ main square stands a statue of a jaguar bearing the message, “In this Amazonian municipality, we care for the jaguar.” After Ixiamas’ community members found the dead jaguar in August 2023, they organized themselves and decided to protect the species. They launched campaigns and shared messages promoting the protection of jaguars, while children dressed up as jaguars and paraded through the town’s streets. The jaguar watches over Ixiamas from the town’s main square. Ixiamas’ community members are working to conserve the species. Image by Iván Paredes. “We…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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