It was 2010 and El Manglito had a reputation as one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in La Paz. Outsiders perceived it as a place where trouble thrived. Taxis often refused to enter. “When we decided to set up our office there, I really thought it was a crazy idea” recalls Liliana Gutierrez, the former program director for Noroeste Sustentable (NOS) in Baja California Sur. “NOS director Alejandro Robles stood in the middle of this maligned place and talked about building a sustainability demonstration center so that people could really see what sustainability could look like in La Paz. Sam Walton wanted to have organic gardens and fisheries restoration projects. He wanted to bring in experts from all over the world to meet the fishermen. Really smart people shared this vision with them, and all I could think is that all these people are completely crazy.” As it turns out, she was right. Continues Liliana, “They were crazy. They were crazy in the most needed way that we need crazy people in the world because from that moment began an amazing story.” And everything they envisioned has come to pass. But that was only once the women got involved.
“Our first communication from the fishermen in El Manglito was a rock through the window of our offices” recalls Liliana. Like the rest of their neighborhood, the fishermen of El Manglito had a particularly bad reputation and were infamous for illegally poaching fish in the protected waters around Isla Espiritu Santo. NOS was part of an Espiritu Santo surveillance alliance that had been literally chasing them in boats in an attempt to restrict their nocturnal thievery, so the rock was not a total surprise. “It was a time of high polarization” notes Liliana with a nod to understatement. “Conservation NGOs like NOS had very strong ideas against the fishermen and the fishermen against the NGOs.”
NOS adapted its thinking. They started reaching out to the fishermen through their children by supporting local soccer teams and eventually the fishermen agreed to meet with them. “When we first went into El Manglito we thought we knew everything about fisheries conservation and all we had to do was convince the fishermen” recalls Liliana. “But we soon realized our approach was not working so we started talking in a very different way. And by that I mean we, NOS, stopped talking. We started listening. And it was beautiful how the whole idea of restoration emerged from them.”
Many of the fishing families of El Manglito are descended from the Yaqui Indians who left Sonora at the turn of the last century to escape government persecution. The Yaquis are renowned freedivers and used these skills in La Paz to fish for the huge scallops called callo de hacha in the Ensenada de La Paz, a lagoon inside the Bay of La Paz whose shores reach El Manglito. But by 2008 their lagoon was dead and their callo de hachas with it. Raw sewage from the city was being pumped in, and tons of the city’s garbage was being picked up by hurricanes and dumped there. The fishermen therefore started going to the rich waters around Isla Espiritu Santo to fish. But in 2010 the Espiritu Santo Archipelago was declared a marine national park, and the fishermen of El Manglito were transformed overnight from legal actors into illegal poachers. They had not been consulted on the process.
But they were resilient. “The fishermen knew it was possible to bring the callo de hacha back, to restore their original fishing area” says Liliana. “We didn’t know it, but they did.” The fishermen knew where the richest points in the bay were for the scallops and knew what needed to be done. “We had assumed that they were evil fishermen and that we were going to save them. Turns out, they knew exactly how to save themselves.” Thus started the callo de hacha restoration project that took seven years and attracted people from all around the world – biologists, conservationists, impact investors. “Everything was happening as Alejandro and that team had dreamed. It was beautiful.”
But only once the women showed up. NOS, with the support of key funders, had made the controversial decision to pay the fishermen during the restoration period while fishing was suspended. Some of their wives were not impressed with the results. Martha Garcia, speaking for herself and her friend Araceli Méndez says, “As soon as our husbands started receiving payment for not fishing during the restoration, our dream of transforming El Manglito into a beautiful, healthy community became just a job for them. They lost the dream.” Araceli didn’t think their husbands were performing particularly well at the job either. El Manglito had instituted a surveillance system at the Conchalito scallop banks to keep the poachers out, and the men were approaching the banks by boat. Notes Araceli, “It gets really shallow there so the boats would get stuck in the mud and the men would just end up having shouting matches with the poachers who would always get away with the scallops overland.” Their friend Graciela Olachea designed a new approach. “We could tell where the poachers were accessing the banks by land” continues Araceli, “So me, Graciela, Martha, and several other women started patrolling the land around the banks and scaring off the poachers that way.” The women achieved in 3 months what the men had failed to achieve in 3 years. The poachers were gone. Liliana sighs ruefully, “We should have started with the women.”
“In 2016 we joined OPRE, the fishing cooperative NOS helped the men create, and in 2018 we named ourselves Las Guardianas del Conchalito,” recalls Martha. “We wanted to do this our own way, for what we believe in. El Manglito had a bad reputation to the outside, but inside we were a strong, vibrant community. We wanted to build on that.” They were so dedicated that even though NOS had funding to pay only 5 women, 14 joined Las Guardianas and shared the pay. They have been sharing triumphs and trials in a similar fashion ever since.
Las Guardianas take turns telling some of their story. “The mangrove area at Conchalito where we ran off the poachers was a disastrous eyesore that served as a drive-through hotel, a drug dealers’ office, and a neighborhood dump” notes Daniela Bareño. “We reclaimed that land for the neighborhood.” Her colleague Claudia Reyes continued. “The first thing we did was push huge stones across the entryway to stop vehicles from entering, then we organized massive trash cleanups in which we got all segments of the neighborhood engaged. We were taking out 3 tons of trash at a time.” Daniela continued, “While we were cleaning the area, a woman came running in who was being pursued by some scary men. Araceli, Marta and I chased those men away. That incident made us realize that women come here because they know that we are women creating a safe space for women.” El Conchalito is now a beautiful public space for the people of La Paz where people come to walk their dogs, go bird watching, and enjoy the mangroves. Rosa Hale, who tracks usage of the area is particularly proud of one statistic, “The number of women using the space has increased by 70% since we started.”
Liliana nominated Las Guardianas for a National Geographic grant. They won and received training in birdwatching to further their dream of guiding people on birding trips through the mangroves. Inspired, Araceli pondered why the women never dove, only the men. They all sent letters to the Women Divers Hall of Fame in the US which awarded a scholarship to each Guardiana who wanted to learn to dive. The photo of Araceli, Martha and Claudia diving with the National Geographic flag is now the stuff of legend.
And this is how Las Guardianas get things done. They support each other to pursue their own passions, and they inform the NGOs about what support is most beneficial to them. While there’s scarcely a high school diploma amongst them, Araceli is now the “biologist” and is the first woman oyster farmer in La Paz; Daniela is the “engineer” who is working on restoring the Conchalito mangroves in conjunction with WildCoast; Claudia is the “Professor” who teaches people about El Conchalito and takes courses on sustainable business initiatives; Rosa is the “Secretary” who generates use statistics for the estuary; and Martha is the “lawyer” who negotiates deals and recently got Las Guardianas incorporated as their own legal entity. More importantly, she negotiated the permit for the group to restore the Conchalito mangroves, the first time such a permit has ever been issued in La Paz.
“This is the paradigm shift that we are seeing in Baja California Sur now” says McKenzie Campbell, the International Community Fund’s Director of Programs. “Local groups like Las Guardianas have clear hopes, goals and solutions for the future of their communities and ecosystems they steward. They know what they need, and our job as a foundation is to support them in their visions and help provide the tools for their success.”
Liliana is now the director of the Mexican Initiative for Seas and Coasts* and continues her work with Las Guardianas. “Las Guardianas take full advantage of the courses offered by local NGOs, and I gave one on Systemic Thinking. But they really didn’t need it” she recalls. “Las Guardianas are systemic by nature. They embrace the idea that their children, the mangroves, the scallops, the ocean, conservation are all one single issue that can’t be separated.” Liliana, once so skeptical of El Manglito, learned what the women always knew: El Manglito is a strong and dynamic community. It just needs tough, loving guardians to continuously defend, protect and transform it. Las Guardianas.
*TRANSLATOR: Iniciativa por los Mares y las Costas de Mexico
“It was so hot and the terrain was so steep and challenging” recalls La Paz-based bighorn sheep hunting translator Angel Antonio Marquez. “We had to stick to the shadows so the sheep couldn’t see us, making the walking even more difficult. When we were 850 yards from the ram the hunter decided to take the shot. We all thought he was crazy since it was so far and we were not at all surprised when he missed. The bullet went right between that sheep’s legs.” Angel continued, “Now this would have scared away most animals, but there was a female sheep nearby and this male was trying to be macho for her so he just stood there. The hunter got him on the second shot. 850 yards. It is the record for the farthest shot in this area.”
According to CONABIO, Mexico’s National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity, in 1800 over 1 million bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis) roamed across the western parts of the US, Canada and northern Mexico. But the introduction of livestock and uncontrolled hunting led to a major decline, and by 1950 there were fewer than 25,000 individual sheep left. The population in northeast Mexico was extirpated and the remaining population in the northwest around Sonora and the Baja peninsula was small and fragmented. It might seem counterintuitive, but hunting is now the main activity, regulated by the Mexican government, helping to stabilize the bighorn sheep population and preserve their habitat.
“This program is an amazing idea” states Biól. Gabriela López Segurajáuregui, the Mexican CITES Scientific Authority Coordinator. “Mexico is a megadiverse country with over 10% of all species in the world. Our conservation challenge is to incentivize people to care for their resources so that they can make a living from them in an ongoing, sustainable way. Bighorn sheep trophy hunting is a major conservation success story in Mexico.”
Gabriela’s colleague M. en C. Luis Guillermo Muñoz Lacy, Chief of the National CITES implementation on Fauna Department, elaborates. “Mexico allows trophy hunting across many species, but bighorn sheep is the most valuable species for hunting in the country, meaning that hunters are willing to pay the most for those permits. The money generated by this program has a tremendously positive economic impact on local communities as well as a tremendously positive conservation impact on the sheep themselves and the lands they roam.” How much money are we talking about? Guillermo explains, “Each bighorn sheep permit in Baja California Sur (BCS) can be sold for USD 50,000 to 90,000. Sonora holds the record at USD 250,000 for one permit. BCS exports about 18 trophies per year.” In other words, it’s a game changer for the rural communities who manage the land and the hunts.
Here’s how it works. In the 1995-1997 timeframe the Mexican government created Conservation Wildlife Management Units (UMAs) to regulate wildlife harvest and non-harvest activities in Mexico, including habitat and species restoration, protection, research and environmental education. In the case of bighorn sheep, UMAs cover most of its habitat. 10 of the UMAs are in BCS and are managed by ejidos, or local communal farmers, and the remainder are across the Sea of Cortez in Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila and Nuevo Leon. Bighorn sheep trophy hunting is carried out within the UMA system in the states of BCS and Sonora. Baja California, the state that occupies the northern half of the Baja peninsula, does not allow hunting.
In 1975 twenty bighorn sheep were reintroduced to Tiburon Island in the Sea of Cortez off the coast of Sonora, and by 2012 that number had grown to 650. Many of those were transplanted to Sonora for repopulation and captive breeding programs and by 2019, the last year for which Sonora published its data, the continental population of bighorn sheep had recovered to 3,829 wild individuals and 4,500 in captivity. By contrast, BCS has only had a couple of reintroduction or reinforcement events and the last aerial survey conducted by SEMARNAT in 2022 estimated about 1,100 individuals in BCS.
The UMAs of BCS pay for a team of technicians to regularly monitor the bighorn sheep population on land, participate in the hunts, and accompany the aerial surveys that are conducted every three years. The technicians are extremely clear in their minds about the value of the trophy program. “If it were not for the economic power of the trophy permits, the Bighorn sheep population would almost certainly have been decimated by now and the ejidos would have sold off most of the land” observes Ing. Antia Duarte Camacho, Field Technician of de Ejido San Jose de la Noria and Ejido Lic. Alfredo V. Bonfil. “The bighorn sheep habitat is all along the Sea of Cortez, making that land extremely valuable.” Her colleague Ecologist Miguel Angel Aguilar Juárez, Field Technician of Ejidos Ley Federal de Aguas 1, 2 and 3 adds, “By 2014 the ejidos, many of which had been impoverished, were really starting to understand the huge, sustained, economic lift flowing from the trophy program. They developed a deep appreciation for the value of the land that they own and the sheep that inhabit it. That is when they all really started working together to make the program work as a whole in BCS. Bighorn sheep move seasonally across a vast territory so corridors are important. Income from bighorn sheep hunting started motivating the ejidos to work together to maintain these huge areas with no other human activities, including the raising of livestock.” CONABIO points to the resulting large-scale habitat conservation and improved connectivity as a major achievement of the trophy hunting program.
Bighorn sheep are extremely desirable among trophy hunters and are part of the sheep Grand Slam. Which leads to the question: how many sheep can you hunt without hurting the species? This is one of the critical questions that Gabriela López of the Mexican CITES Scientific Authority (CONABIO) and her team focus on. The UMAs organize to finance an aerial census of the bighorn sheep habitat every three years in the September-December timeframe. The survey is done in coordination with SEMARNAT, CONABIO and key experts. It is this survey that serves as the basis for issuing the harvest rate. Gabriela explains further, “We estimate that the aerial survey team makes visual contact with roughly 30% of the total population. As a precautionary measure we determine the number of trophy hunts that will be allowed based solely on the number of individual sheep actually observed, not the extrapolated number.” Only males that are 6 years or older can be hunted – an estimation made by the size of the horns – and the number to be hunted cannot exceed 10-20% of the observed population in each region. (The hunting guides note that hunters are not tempted by younger rams as they are going for the largest horns possible and those are, by definition, found on the oldest males. Males can live 9-12 years in the wild.) Based on the aerial survey of 2019, 18 trophy (harvest) permits were issued per year to the UMAS of BCS by SEMARNAT based on the technical and scientific advice of CONABIO. That number increased to 19 trophy permits per year based on the 2022 aerial survey. The next aerial survey will be conducted in December of 2025.
Once SEMARNAT issues the number of CITES permits to export trophies (CITES is the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) the UMAs work with brokers based in the United States to auction off the permits in places like Las Vegas and Reno. The brokers retain 15% of the permit fee and the remainder goes to the UMA and its ejido. The UMAs would like to see the auctions moved to BCS.
The horns and skin of the bighorn sheep shot by the hunter at 850 yards are still in the office of the technical team in La Paz. Issuance of the CITES permit for the trophy to be transported across international borders to the US-based hunter could take 3-4 months (SEMARNAT must also be consulted). CITES is a legally binding agreement between governments that works to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals or plants does not threaten the survival of the species. Only Mexico’s bighorn sheep population is listed on CITES Appendix II which covers species that are not necessarily threatened by international trade but that are deemed worthy of a close eye so that they do not slip into the highest category of endangerment, Appendix I. When weighing the permit to send this hunter his trophy they will carefully review, among other things, the report of the UMA technician who accompanied the hunt and took detailed notes on the geographical coordinates of where the sheep was hunted, estimated age, days taken to carry out the hunt and so forth. The technician also took biological samples for disease analysis.
Gabriela, Guillermo and the technical team for the UMAs all note that trophy hunting is extremely controversial in Mexico. Even some of the very officials whose offices support trophy hunting personally speak out against it. The IUCN, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, has long supported sustainable, properly managed trophy hunting in conservation when it provides incentives for people to conserve the trophy species and their habitats. Sacrificing a few for the many is a concept that will never unify humanity, but by the IUCN’s measure – and that of CONABIO, CITES and the UMAs – the bighorn sheep trophy program has been a success in BCS, for the species, its habitat, and for the local communities.
How the permit funds are used:
Del pago que se hace a las UMAS por la venta de los permiso para la caza de borrego cimarron el 70% es entregado a las ejidatarios dueños de las las tierras donde se encuentra la UMA y 30% es dedicado a la conservación, donde se realizan las siguentes actividades:
Actividades de conservación implementadas
Colocación de letreros, puertas de acceso Placement of signs, gates
Censo aéreo Aerial Census
Plan de Acción para la Conservación y manejo de las Sierras Borregueras de B.C.S.
(Con apoyo de SEMARNAT)
Limpieza y rehabilitación de aguajes Cleaning and rehabilitation of Aguajes
Monitoreo y Vigilancia Monitoring and surveillance
Capacitación Training courses
Delimitación de las áreas de distribución e identificación de corredores biológicos
Delimitation of the areas of distribution and identification of biological corridors
Identificación de la problemática con la fauna feral Identification of the problem with feral fauna
Entrega de reportes anuales a SEMARNAT Activity Report
Construcción de corrales para el manejo de fauna feral Construction of corrals for feral wildlife management
Programa de manejo de fauna feral Program implementation of feral animal management
Mejoramiento de hábitat Improvement of habitat
Diversificación de actividades: ecoturismo, cabañas, aprovechamiento cinegético de otras especies Diversification of activities: ecotourism, cabins, hunting of other species
Todos Santos is beloved for its rugged coastline and water. Josh Withers/Unsplash
The shimmering emerald cove beckons; reaching it requires a trek up the cacti-dotted cliffs under the Baja sun, then a scramble across boulders on a small beach. But if you arrive at the right time, the water is calm enough for a swim, and you may spot sea lions on the rocks or a whale in the distance. You might also, unfortunately, see a few plastic bottles.
This popular trail in Todos Santos, Baja California Sur, became a favorite of mine during the nearly two years I was based there. Now the small town is grappling with the effects of enchanted visitors who end up staying (hello, me), and it’s trying to avoid going the way of other overdeveloped coastal areas—ones without the infrastructure to support rapid growth, thus ending up with overflowing landfills and waste that leaches into the ocean (hello, Tulum).
“How do we prevent ourselves from becoming just another overrun beach town?” Bryan Jáuregui says. She’s a founding member of Alianza Cero Basura – Zero Waste Alliance, a community-led initiative to implement a plan for a zero-waste future for Todos Santos and the neighboring town of El Pescadero. Jáuregui’s question has urgency: These towns are located in Baja California Sur, the least populated but fastest-growing state in Mexico. As the co-owner of Todos Santos Eco Adventures and Los Colibris Casitas boutique hotel, she calls it “enlightened self-interest” to take on her town’s waste problem.
This tension is not unique to Baja. Around the world, destinations are struggling to balance tourism and economic growth for locals while protecting their natural resources. And even though travelers are more conscious of their environmental footprints than ever, what can they realistically do about them? Is leaving behind zero waste during travel even possible?
Born out of the 1970s ethos of environmental advocacy, the zero-waste movement is focused on sending as little material waste to landfills as possible. The “five Rs” of a zero-waste lifestyle, coined by Bea Johnson in her book, Zero Waste Home, are the movement’s mantra: refuse, reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot (i.e., compost).
A growing number of individuals are embracing these concepts at home: They are eschewing single-use plastics, purchasing bulk items at grocery stores, and taking their food scraps to community compost centers. It gets harder, however, to keep this mindset on the road: Most travelers eat out for most meals and, depending on where they go, don’t necessarily have access to potable drinking water. Travelers are inherently overconsumers.
In some places, tourists generate up to twice as much waste as residents due to the packaged goods they buy, including travel-size toiletries. Eight out of 10 tourists visit coastal areas, contributing to the 8 million tons of plastic that enters oceans and kills 100,000 marine animals a year, according to the United Nations Environment Programme. But it’s more than plastic; often overlooked is food waste. The hotel industry alone produces 79,000 tons of food waste yearly. Cruise ships can generate about 1.3 pounds per person per day on average. Cutting down can make a significant difference, says Vishal Kumar, CEO of Waste Warriors, a nonprofit in the Indian Himalayan Region.
“The creation of less waste means less demand for the production, packaging, and distribution of goods, which results in reduced greenhouse gas emissions throughout the value chain,” Kumar says. When organic waste is dumped into landfills, it releases methane, which has 20 to 80 times more global warming potential than CO2. Aiming for zero waste, then, is a climate solution.
We don’t need 12 people doing zero waste perfectly each year. We need 12 thousand, or 12 million people doing it imperfectly. Court Whelan
In 2007, Natural Habitat Adventures eliminated plastic water bottles from their trips and became the world’s first carbon-neutral travel company. It then took on another ever-growing environmental issue: waste.
Twelve years later, in July 2019, the company led the world’s first zero-waste trip in Yellowstone National Park. To divert 99 percent of the trip’s waste—which would otherwise end up in a landfill—guests carried bamboo cutlery that they washed between meals and a compost bucket for all uneaten food scraps.
While Natural Habitat Adventures isn’t leading 100 percent zero-waste adventures anymore, that doesn’t mean the experiment failed. “We learned that zero waste is possible. However, it is indeed very resource- and time-intensive,” says Court Whelan, chief sustainability officer of Natural Habitat Adventures, of the 18 months researching and planning for the trip.
“I don’t think the extreme confines of zero-waste travel is the end goal. I think examples of zero waste, whether it’s on a certain trip or camp, leave an inspirational echo across the industry.” It’s more about instigating change, and any “waste-lessening movement” is moving toward the goal line, he adds.
“We don’t need 12 people doing zero waste perfectly each year. We need 12 thousand or 12 million people doing it imperfectly.”
One of the best ways travelers can work toward a zero-waste mindset on the road is to dig deeper into where their dollars are going.
Alianza Cero Basura created a way for travelers to support businesses in Todos Santos and El Pescadero that self-assess their waste-reductions impact with a directory of Waste Wise All Stars. Beyond using this guide to find local restaurants and hotels actively working to reduce their waste, travelers can fill up their water bottles at one of Alianza’s refill stations installed throughout town. Alianza also created the first community-led organic waste farm and research center in Baja California Sur; it produces soil-enhancing products and compost, diverting 60 percent of the town’s organic waste from the landfill.
Meanwhile, Norwegian cruise company Hurtigruten—which banned single-use plastics in 2018 and has introduced zero-emissions vehicles and hybrid-powered cruise ships—in April 2024 launched a zero-edible-food-waste program with a goal to, well, reduce food waste to zero grams per guest. Edible food waste from Hurtigruten’s Original Coastal Express ships, which sail along the coast of Norway, will be composted and sent to a local farm that will use it to cultivate products that Hurtigruten will use in its menus. “Farm to fleet to farm” is its goal.
Still, the most obvious and easiest way to create less waste is by refusing. Consider: The more things we acquire, the more things will become waste. On the road, think about what you need. Can you split dishes with your fellow travelers? Get bulk snacks for your road trip? Share some gear instead of everyone packing their own?
Another simple habit is employing reusables—and not just a water bottle. You can buy a zero-waste travel kit, or make one of your own, which could include a reusable tote bag (I carry my trusty Baggu bag on every trip); a reusable silverware kit that doesn’t look like camping gear; and bags and capsules to carry toiletries. My collection of silicone Stasher bags are for more than packing snacks; I use them to carry all my toiletries, which are poured into my magnetic, stackable Cadence Refillable Travel Capsules.
Pack light, and pack items that have multiple uses. Not only does doing so lessen your carbon footprint, but also it can save your sanity and budget. Instead of buying new gear for every trip, consider renting or buying used gear: On a ski trip in Aspen this year, I rented ski pants from Suit Yourself, a mobile ski clothes outfitter. Kit Lender rents outdoor gear and apparel, and Patagonia and REI let you buy and sell your clothing. (Check out AFAR’s guide to places to buy used clothing gear.) Root Adventures also discourages buying new gear by offering a subsidy for any pretrip gear repair, and it includes gear rentals in the trip price.
Mindsets change—maybe not overnight, but slowly, actions create momentum and conservation culture grows. One of the best ways to do this is to let your dollars do the talking, Whelan says. “Single-use is technically easier. Are we happier people because we are consistently able to make and do the easiest thing possible?”
Zero-waste travel is indeed complicated to attempt and even more difficult to adopt perfectly. When we travel, we’re always pushing ourselves—to climb that mountain, to make that plane connection, to attempt that phrase in Spanish. When we put the effort in, we’re rewarded. Leaving nothing behind is just another mindset to get used to.
Kathleen Rellihan is a travel journalist and editor covering adventure, culture, climate, and sustainability. Formerly Newsweek‘s travel editor, she contributes to outlets such as AFAR, Outside, TIME, CNN Travel, and more.
Sustainable Ranching and the Cowboy Museum in El Triunfo
The new Museo de Vaqueros del las Californias in El Triunfo – The Cowboy Museum – is an intimate, yet gorgeously expansive look at the 300 years of families, traditions, skills and tools that bind the Californias of Mexico and the United States in ways that no war or border can erase. It is a celebration of the great vaquero / cowboy culture that was born in Baja California, moved north with the cattle to Alta California, and still thrives today throughout the western United States.
The museum exhibits are punctuated with the fantastically beautiful paintings of La Paz artist Carlos César Diaz Castro, who created ten paintings and two murals to help tell the vaquero’s story, as well as stunning photos of present-day vaquero life by renowned Baja California Sur photographer Miguel Angel de la Cueva. As with its sister museum in El Triunfo, Museo Ruta de la Plata / the Silver Route Museum, one of the museum’s most compelling exhibits is the oral history section, in which members of local ranching families share their stories, histories and anecdotes.
But perhaps one of the most interesting themes running throughout the museum in small plaques and chalk drawing prints is that of sustainability. Interwoven with exhibits of criollo pigs and cattle brought from the Iberian Peninsula, is the explanation of Transhumance, livestock practices with minimal environmental impact that the Spanish brought with them to the New World that involved the environmentally sustainable practice of seasonal livestock migration. This practice is now a cornerstone of regenerative cattle ranching, and you don’t have to go far from the museum to see it in action. Christy Walton’s innovacionesAlumbra, an alliance of sustainable businesses in Baja California Sur, is the owner not only of the Cowboy Museum, but also of Rancho Cacachilas – about an hour’s drive from the Cowboy Museum – where modern day cowboys are fast at work restoring the land.
Florent Gomis, a Frenchman who came to Baja to study the Ecology of Desert Climates, is the Director of Sustainability at Rancho Cacachilas, and Transhumance is at the heart of his efforts. “In Baja California Sur as elsewhere in the ranching world, livestock has been blamed for the destruction of the land. In reality, the cattle aren’t the problem, it’s the management of the cattle.” Florent explains further. “Before there were vaqueros, herds of herbivores were motivated by predators to keep moving from place to place and that movement kept the land from being overgrazed. What we are working to achieve here at Rancho Cacachilas is the restoration of the impact that wild herds of herbivores once had on the land. These wild herds would continually move location, giving lands time to recover from their impact before their return. Here at Rancho Cacachilas we manage animals in groups and keep them moving, letting the land they had previously occupied rest for at least a year.”
While cattle are typically decried as destructive, Florent sees them as part of a restorative, creative process. “We really view the cattle as gardeners. When they move to a new grazing area, their hooves break the hard-packed dirt, allowing water and minerals to infiltrate the land. The cattle’s dung and urine are full soil-revitalizing carbon and nutrients, and as the cattle graze they trample these riches into the ground, resulting in the regeneration of the land. In a relatively short period of time we have seen these eroded, barren lands become covered in vegetation.”
The benefits of Transhumance don’t stop there. “One of the really cool things about this process of regenerating the soil is that it also regenerates the rain cycle” explains Florent. “Lots of vegetation on the land has a cooling effect on the atmosphere, causing clouds to precipitate on the land. So from what was once this vast cycle of death – overgrazing, monoculture, fertilizers and pesticides – you get this great cycle of life. The cows create nutritious soil so chemicals are not needed, the soil retains water and supports vegetation, the vegetation improves the soil, attracts more rain and feeds the cows, and the rain replenishes the whole, holistic system.” Florent notes that at Rancho Cacachilas, the same amount of land that could previously support only one cow, will soon support four. Moreover, with the increased vegetation for the cattle to eat, the ranch’s need for nutritional supplements for the cattle has dropped dramatically, resulting in substantial savings.
Rancho Cacachilas aims to be its own kind of Cowboy Museum. They’ve taken the lessons from the past, applied them to the present, and plan to share what they’re learning about managing cattle in the specific conditions of Baja California Sur with ranchers throughout the peninsula. The past comes alive at the beautiful new Cowboy Museum in El Triunfo. The past is alive down the road at Rancho Cacachilas.
When Christian Liñan decided to open his third restaurant in La Paz in 2017, he resolved to work only with 100% traceable, sustainably-caught local seafood. That made his seafood supply chain logistics pretty simple: he bought totoaba from Earth Ocean Farms in La Paz and oysters from Sol Azul in San Ignacio. That was it. “I have at least 15 different recipes for totoaba” he notes.
A combination of the pandemic and interminable neighborhood renovation forced the closure of that restaurant, but Christian’s commitment to traceable, sustainably-caught seafood has spanned decades and was not snuffed by a mere change of circumstance. His talent was recognized by COMEPESCA, the Mexican Council for the Promotion of Fisheries and Aquaculture Products, and as of January 2023 Christian is the Baja representative of COMEPESCA’s wildly successful program Pesca Con Futuro / Fishing with a Future. Explains Christian, “Pesca Con Futuro started in the Yucatan peninsula in 2017 and became a highly successful, high profile coalition of chefs, fishermen, producers, marketers and distributors, all committed to responsible, sustainable, in-season consumption. They all agreed to abide by the rules that promote biodiversity of species in Mexico and avoid overexploitation, thereby guaranteeing the future of fishing and aquaculture in Mexico. The 120 eminent Mexican chefs in the Yucatan peninsula who committed to Pesca Con Futuro have had such a huge impact as they are able to transmit the concept of responsible consumption and sustainable fishing and aquaculture directly to consumers via their menus and cuisine. It is truly impressive to see what they have achieved.”
COMEPESCA didn’t tap Christian to be the Baja representative of Pesca Con Futuro just because he’s a chef with an interest in sustainability. Nor did they choose him just because of his degree in Marine Sciences from CIBNOR in La Paz. One of the key reasons they chose him is because he has witnessed firsthand the importance of engaging the full chain of players in protecting marine species. In 2009, fresh out of CIBNOR, Christian joined Noroeste Sustentable (NOS) in the upper Gulf of California (Sea of Cortez). At that time the fisheries of the upper Gulf had thousands of pangas, each of which was catching roughly three tons of fish daily, mainly with gillnets. There was no management system or operating agreement among the fisheries or with the distributors, with the result that all those thousands of tons of fish were just being dumped on the market and collapsing prices. Fishers were taking home only 6 to 10 pesos per kilo of fish and fish stocks were being rapidly depleted. It is therefore not surprising that some fishers were tempted to traffic in the highly lucrative totoaba swim bladder trade. The totoaba is an iconic, endemic marine fish species of the upper Gulf. Its swim bladder is highly prized in some parts of Asia for both its purported medicinal properties and as a status symbol. As totoaba swim bladders can sell for as much as USD 80,000 per kilo, they became known as the “cocaine of the sea” and attracted the same cartels in Mexico and China that traffic in such illicit substances.
Violence came to the upper Gulf, and to say that it was a complex and dangerous work environment is a severe understatement. And humans were not the only mammals that suffered from the totoaba swim bladder trade. The totoaba shares its habitat with the Vaquita porpoise, the smallest dolphin in the world. The illegal gillnets used to trap the totoaba caught and killed huge numbers of Vaquita, which rapidly became critically endangered.
It was in this environment that Christian and NOS started the Fish Less and Gain More campaign. Through incredibly hard work in the communities they were able to create an agreement among the fisheries to catch and sell fewer tons of fish, with the result that prices rose from 6-10 pesos per kilo to 20 pesos per kilo. To protect the Vaquita, they also enforced the ban on gillnets, as well as the ban on fishing in the Vaquita’s habitat. It was all going extremely well, until it wasn’t. “Unfortunately there was really no way to enforce the agreement across all the fishing communities of the upper Gulf, with the result that some areas simply ignored the agreement and ultimately after two years prices collapsed again. Gillnetting in the Vaquita habitat resumed. The NGO and donors that had supported the program decided to close it. I was so sad and frustrated.”
Which is exactly why the Pesca Con Futuro program excites him so much – all the key players in the seafood supply chain are engaged, not just the fishermen. With chefs on the front line creating demand among consumers for eco-friendly caught, traceable seafood, the fishers, distributors and marketers realize that they have to get in line with market expectations. But, notes Christian, “It is almost impossible for fisheries to get sustainable certification.” That is why Pesca Con Futuro is a champion of the Fishery Improvement Project, FIP. “The FIP is a group of organizations and people who work collaboratively to achieve the sustainability of a fishery in the shortest possible time” notes Christian. “It is a clear and simple way to share good practices and teach about traceability. Organizations that participate in credible FIPs are considered reliable sources of supply and allies of sustainable products.” The list of FIP projects in Mexico can be found at: https://fisheryprogress.org/
Christian continues, “Sustainability is the responsibility of each of us who make up the consumption, production and supply chain, a task that must be permanent. At Pesca Con Futuro we link the different actors in the value chain, making various support tools available to them to achieve informed and responsible purchases of sustainable seafood.”
Christian believes that sustainability’s time has come for the seafood market. “In the 1990s consumers were all demanding “light” products. In the 2000s it was organic produce, and now in the 2020s the public is really turning its focus to sustainability. Pesca Con Futuro is here to both increase that awareness, and to make sure that in Mexico in general and Baja California in particular that sustainable seafood practices are widespread and sustainably-caught, 100% traceable seafood is widely available to the public.”
What about that totoaba he was cooking with at his restaurant in 2017? It represents the future he hopes to see for all of Baja. Pablo Konietzko, vice president of COMEPESCA and the founder of Earth Ocean Farms, a state-of-the-art facility in La Paz which raises the totoaba explains. “In 2012 we got special permits from SEMARNAT, the agency in charge of protecting marine species, to fish for totoaba breeding stock in the upper Gulf of California. Since we brought in those first fish we have kept meticulous records such that we can fully trace the bloodline of every fish from the hatchery to the table. It is impossible for someone to imitate our fish or pass off wild totoaba as EOF-raised.” Not only is Pablo raising totoaba for the seafood market, he is helping the totoaba to recover in the wild. Notes Pablo, “For the past 7 years we have held totoaba restocking events in Bahia Concepcion in the Gulf of California, near Mulege. We have successfully released over 175,000 juveniles into the sea, and we will continue the program each year.”
Christian could not be more thrilled to be working with Pesca Con Futuro in Baja. “It is truly an honor and a privilege to do this” he says. But the work falls to each of us. Next time you order seafood at a restaurant, ask if it was sustainably caught, and if it can be traced. Only in this way can you be sure that your favorite seafood will continue to be on the menu not only for you, but for the generations to come.
NOS adapted its thinking. They started reaching out to the fishermen through their children by supporting local soccer teams and eventually the fishermen agreed to meet with them. “When we first went into El Manglito we thought we knew everything about fisheries conservation and all we had to do was convince the fishermen” recalls Liliana. “But we soon realized our approach was not working so we started talking in a very different way. And by that I mean we, NOS, stopped talking. We started listening. And it was beautiful how the whole idea of restoration emerged from them.”
But they were resilient. “The fishermen knew it was possible to bring the callo de hacha back, to restore their original fishing area” says Liliana. “We didn’t know it, but they did.” The fishermen knew where the richest points in the bay were for the scallops and knew what needed to be done. “We had assumed that they were evil fishermen and that we were going to save them. Turns out, they knew exactly how to save themselves.” Thus started the callo de hacha restoration project that took seven years and attracted people from all around the world – biologists, conservationists, impact investors. “Everything was happening as Alejandro and that team had dreamed. It was beautiful.”
But only once the women showed up. NOS, with the support of key funders, had made the controversial decision to pay the fishermen during the restoration period while fishing was suspended. Some of their wives were not impressed with the results. Martha Garcia, speaking for herself and her friend Araceli Méndez says, “As soon as our husbands started receiving payment for not fishing during the restoration, our dream of transforming El Manglito into a beautiful, healthy community became just a job for them. They lost the dream.” Araceli didn’t think their husbands were performing particularly well at the job either. El Manglito had instituted a surveillance system at the Conchalito scallop banks to keep the poachers out, and the men were approaching the banks by boat. Notes Araceli, “It gets really shallow there so the boats would get stuck in the mud and the men would just end up having shouting matches with the poachers who would always get away with the scallops overland.” Their friend Graciela Olachea designed a new approach. “We could tell where the poachers were accessing the banks by land” continues Araceli, “So me, Graciela, Martha, and several other women started patrolling the land around the banks and scaring off the poachers that way.” The women achieved in 3 months what the men had failed to achieve in 3 years. The poachers were gone. Liliana sighs ruefully, “We should have started with the women.”
Las Guardianas take turns telling some of their story. “The mangrove area at Conchalito where we ran off the poachers was a disastrous eyesore that served as a drive-through hotel, a drug dealers’ office, and a neighborhood dump” notes Daniela Bareño. “We reclaimed that land for the neighborhood.” Her colleague Claudia Reyes continued. “The first thing we did was push huge stones across the entryway to stop vehicles from entering, then we organized massive trash cleanups in which we got all segments of the neighborhood engaged. We were taking out 3 tons of trash at a time.” Daniela continued, “While we were cleaning the area, a woman came running in who was being pursued by some scary men. Araceli, Marta and I chased those men away. That incident made us realize that women come here because they know that we are women creating a safe space for women.” El Conchalito is now a beautiful public space for the people of La Paz where people come to walk their dogs, go bird watching, and enjoy the mangroves. Rosa Hale, who tracks usage of the area is particularly proud of one statistic, “The number of women using the space has increased by 70% since we started.”
Liliana nominated Las Guardianas for a National Geographic grant. They won and received training in birdwatching to further their dream of guiding people on birding trips through the mangroves. Inspired, Araceli pondered why the women never dove, only the men. They all sent letters to the Women Divers Hall of Fame in the US which awarded a scholarship to each Guardiana who wanted to learn to dive. The photo of Araceli, Martha and Claudia diving with the National Geographic flag is now the stuff of legend.
And this is how Las Guardianas get things done. They support each other to pursue their own passions, and they inform the NGOs about what support is most beneficial to them. While there’s scarcely a high school diploma amongst them, Araceli is now the “biologist” and is the first woman oyster farmer in La Paz; Daniela is the “engineer” who is working on restoring the Conchalito mangroves in conjunction with WildCoast; Claudia is the “Professor” who teaches people about El Conchalito and takes courses on sustainable business initiatives; Rosa is the “Secretary” who generates use statistics for the estuary; and Martha is the “lawyer” who negotiates deals and recently got Las Guardianas incorporated as their own legal entity. More importantly, she negotiated the permit for the group to restore the Conchalito mangroves, the first time such a permit has ever been issued in La Paz.
“It was so hot and the terrain was so steep and challenging” recalls La Paz-based bighorn sheep hunting translator Angel Antonio Marquez. “We had to stick to the shadows so the sheep couldn’t see us, making the walking even more difficult. When we were 850 yards from the ram the hunter decided to take the shot. We all thought he was crazy since it was so far and we were not at all surprised when he missed. The bullet went right between that sheep’s legs.” Angel continued, “Now this would have scared away most animals, but there was a female sheep nearby and this male was trying to be macho for her so he just stood there. The hunter got him on the second shot. 850 yards. It is the record for the farthest shot in this area.”
The UMAs of BCS pay for a team of technicians to regularly monitor the bighorn sheep population on land, participate in the hunts, and accompany the aerial surveys that are conducted every three years. The technicians are extremely clear in their minds about the value of the trophy program. “If it were not for the economic power of the trophy permits, the Bighorn sheep population would almost certainly have been decimated by now and the ejidos would have sold off most of the land” observes Ing. Antia Duarte Camacho, Field Technician of de Ejido San Jose de la Noria and Ejido Lic. Alfredo V. Bonfil. “The bighorn sheep habitat is all along the Sea of Cortez, making that land extremely valuable.” Her colleague Ecologist Miguel Angel Aguilar Juárez, Field Technician of Ejidos Ley Federal de Aguas 1, 2 and 3 adds, “By 2014 the ejidos, many of which had been impoverished, were really starting to understand the huge, sustained, economic lift flowing from the trophy program. They developed a deep appreciation for the value of the land that they own and the sheep that inhabit it. That is when they all really started working together to make the program work as a whole in BCS. Bighorn sheep move seasonally across a vast territory so corridors are important. Income from bighorn sheep hunting started motivating the ejidos to work together to maintain these huge areas with no other human activities, including the raising of livestock.” CONABIO points to the resulting large-scale habitat conservation and improved connectivity as a major achievement of the trophy hunting program.
The horns and skin of the bighorn sheep shot by the hunter at 850 yards are still in the office of the technical team in La Paz. Issuance of the CITES permit for the trophy to be transported across international borders to the US-based hunter could take 3-4 months (SEMARNAT must also be consulted). CITES is a legally binding agreement between governments that works to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals or plants does not threaten the survival of the species. Only Mexico’s bighorn sheep population is listed on CITES Appendix II which covers species that are not necessarily threatened by international trade but that are deemed worthy of a close eye so that they do not slip into the highest category of endangerment, Appendix I. When weighing the permit to send this hunter his trophy they will carefully review, among other things, the report of the UMA technician who accompanied the hunt and took detailed notes on the geographical coordinates of where the sheep was hunted, estimated age, days taken to carry out the hunt and so forth. The technician also took biological samples for disease analysis.
The new Museo de Vaqueros del las Californias in El Triunfo – The Cowboy Museum – is an intimate, yet gorgeously expansive look at the 300 years of families, traditions, skills and tools that bind the Californias of Mexico and the United States in ways that no war or border can erase. It is a celebration of the great vaquero / cowboy culture that was born in Baja California, moved north with the cattle to Alta California, and still thrives today throughout the western United States.
But perhaps one of the most interesting themes running throughout the museum in small plaques and chalk drawing prints is that of sustainability. Interwoven with exhibits of criollo pigs and cattle brought from the Iberian Peninsula, is the explanation of Transhumance, livestock practices with minimal environmental impact that the Spanish brought with them to the New World that involved the environmentally sustainable practice of seasonal livestock migration. This practice is now a cornerstone of regenerative cattle ranching, and you don’t have to go far from the museum to see it in action. Christy Walton’s innovacionesAlumbra, an alliance of sustainable businesses in Baja California Sur, is the owner not only of the Cowboy Museum, but also of Rancho Cacachilas – about an hour’s drive from the Cowboy Museum – where modern day cowboys are fast at work restoring the land.
While cattle are typically decried as destructive, Florent sees them as part of a restorative, creative process. “We really view the cattle as gardeners. When they move to a new grazing area, their hooves break the hard-packed dirt, allowing water and minerals to infiltrate the land. The cattle’s dung and urine are full soil-revitalizing carbon and nutrients, and as the cattle graze they trample these riches into the ground, resulting in the regeneration of the land. In a relatively short period of time we have seen these eroded, barren lands become covered in vegetation.”
Rancho Cacachilas aims to be its own kind of Cowboy Museum. They’ve taken the lessons from the past, applied them to the present, and plan to share what they’re learning about managing cattle in the specific conditions of Baja California Sur with ranchers throughout the peninsula. The past comes alive at the beautiful new Cowboy Museum in El Triunfo. The past is alive down the road at Rancho Cacachilas.
When Christian Liñan decided to open his third restaurant in La Paz in 2017, he resolved to work only with 100% traceable, sustainably-caught local seafood. That made his seafood supply chain logistics pretty simple: he bought totoaba from Earth Ocean Farms in La Paz and oysters from Sol Azul in San Ignacio. That was it. “I have at least 15 different recipes for totoaba” he notes.