"We face a situation where people are playing triage with endangered species, saying there are some we are going to lose no mater what we do," Butcher said.
"A bunch of us got together and said, We're not willing to do that … Jocotoco is on the front edge of that" idea.
All of the areas where the Jocotoco Foundation works, Butcher added, are on the frontiers of human settlement. Without the reserves, the habitats would be doomed by logging and agriculture.
Barking Bird
The Jocotoco project began when Robert Ridgley, now vice president for endangered bird conservation with the American Bird Conservancy, discovered the Jocotoco antpitta on a field expedition in Ecuador.
Ridgley and a fellow birder were recording bird calls in the dank, mossy underbrush of the cloud forest just outside Podocarpus National Park. Suddenly they heard a strange noise similar to a dog's bark.
Forty-five minutes later they heard it again, made a recording, and played it back.
Birders use the playback technique to lure birds out of the brush. The birds think the recorded call is an intruder and charge after it to defend their territory, Ridgley explained.
The technique worked: A pair of antpittas bounded after the scientists for over half an hour, giving them a detailed look at a species never before seen by western scientists.
"It's got very long stilt legs," Ridgley said in a Pulse of the Planet radio program broadcast today.
(This series and the Pulse of the Planet radio program are sponsored in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation.)
"They're blue-gray in color, and [it has] a very short tail, so it can either run very fast or hop. It actually hops kangaroolike at times. And it's about 10 inches [25 centimeters] long."
In 1998 Krabbe scientifically described the species and named it Grallaria ridgelyi.
He added that, while the antpitta's song sounds like a barking dog, its call sounds like its common name, Jocotoco.
The Jocotoco antpitta is more colorful than other antpittas, Krabbe said. A white patch on the cheek contrasts with the species' white head.
"And it is extremely rare and vocalizes very little, so it's very difficult to find," he said.
Silent Type?
As of September 2005, scientists had identified just 12 territories where the species lives. All but two are in the foundation's Tapichalaca Reserve.
The global population may be less than 30 individuals.
Scientists believe the bird also resides inside the adjacent Podocarpus National Park, though none have been sighted there.
"We're not really sure exactly if it's extremely rare or, because it vocalizes so little, it's hard to find. I suspect the latter; others suspect the former," Krabbe said.
According to Krabbe, most of the Jocotoco antpitta's known habitat would have been cut down if the foundation hadn't started buying land.
The foundation continues to work at purchasing the bird's remaining intact habitat adjacent to the Podocarpus National Park.
Most of the reserves include lodging facilities open to bird-watching tours, though tourism is an afterthought, Krabbe said.
"We are worried we'll get too many visitors," he said. "We dont want visitors to these areas to actually have an impact on the nature there.
"It is primarily to protect birds that we purchased these areas. Tourism comes in second."
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