The golden-furred mammal lay lifeless in the middle of Costa Rica’s Primary Route 32 under the tropical sun. It had been crossing a stretch of the highway that winds through a lush rainforest in Braulio Carrillo National Park. Whether the nocturnal kinkajou—also known as a “honey bear”— had been foraging for ripe berries or returning home after a night’s roam through the trees, it died on asphalt, struck in the stream of vehicles zooming back and forth.
Such is the cruel destiny many wild animals face on the frequented routes of Costa Rica. Highways are teeming with nature lovers on their way to immerse themselves in the tropical jungles, many hoping to spot or photograph a tree-dweller like the kinkajou.
But too often, ecotourists may encounter that shy mammal, snake or frog struck on the roadside. More than 16,000 wild animals have died from vehicle collisions in the last decade—and that is only along a small fraction of the 44,316 kilometers of Costa Rica’s highways, daily traversed by approximately 1.6 million drivers.
Researchers estimate that four animals an hour die on Costa Rican highways. Biologist Daniela Araya Gamboa, project coordinator at Panthera, reported 176 dead animals on 48 kilometers of Route 2 in the span of three months. The list included squirrels, mice, armadillos, tapirs and birds, with amphibians the most affected species. Researchers have reported nearly 500 wild cats struck in the last decade.
Costa Rica is considered one of the world’s leaders in forest conservation, reversing deforestation to the extent that more than half of the land is covered with forest. But ironically, the growth of ecotourists heading to those forests puts the wild animals they love at greater risk of car strikes.
Birds, sloths, monkeys, and other arboreal species dwell in the canopy of the forest where they are sheltered from raptors and ground predators. Sloths, Costa Rica’s national animal, normally move slowly amid the tree branches, all lethargy and beige fluffiness. But habitat fragmentation can force them to descend and try to cross roads, where traffic collisions are one of their biggest threats to survival.
Kinkajous, with their flexible limbs and grasping tails, likewise navigate the canopy from one branch to another, until there is nothing left to swing to except the ground and the perilous highway. Below them, terrestrial mammals like ungulates and wild cats equally fall prey to the relentless stream of vehicles.
Even monkeys, common mammals in Costa Rica, are becoming imperiled due to car strikes, electrocution on power lines, and other threats that push them out of their jungles and into human throughways. “Unfortunately, between vehicle collisions, fragmentation and habitat loss, monkeys could become extinct in the not-so-distant future,” says Rose Marie Menacho Odio, a biologist with Universidad Estatal a Distancia Costa Rica.
The grim wildlife checklist
iNaturalist has been used for nearly 20 years to record and identify flora and fauna around the world.
Now, the app is part of a global effort to quantify the negative impacts of roads on highways—finding the deadliest spots so that scientists can target them for solutions. The campaign “Roadkill Reported in Costa Rica's Highways” launched in 2013 to aid in developing nationwide strategies for road conservation.
Since then, users have reported more than 3,400 observations of 306 distinct species. Among the major reported victims are possums, sloths, monkeys, snakes and armadillos.
The alarm has mobilized the Costa Rican government and partners to adopt prevention measures to reduce road mortality. With distinctive silhouettes of keystone species like Baird’s tapir, wildlife crossing signs aim to make speeding drivers slow down.
Aerial crossings or bridges made of rope and nylon installed over highways represent a chance of survival for kinkajous and arboreal species that swing from one tree branch to another. But what about animals like ocelots and frogs that are unable to use suspended bridges high up in the air?
In his book “Crossings,” Ben Goldfarb describes one of road ecology’s most important formulas: underpasses beneath fenced highways.
Underpasses without fencing and fences without underpasses prove inefficient—but the two working in tandem allow terrestrial animals such as tapirs to migrate to the other side of a road. Culverts indirectly serve as crossings since they function as waterways but are large enough for animals.
Gamboa and her team at Panthera, a non-governmental organization in Costa Rica dedicated to preserving the 40 species of wild cats, have been working on the “Wild Cats Friendly Roads Project.”
They scout the highways for dead animals using GPS, and set up camera traps in the canopy, forest floors and culverts to determine roadkill hotspots. The purpose is to provide government agencies with usable data for the installation of wildlife crossings and better road planning.
Road construction, too, now follows a rigorous process that considers sustainability criteria before being greenlit.
“Today if you want to build a road, you have to do an environmental study to minimize the impact and you have to generate job opportunities for the locals.” Andrés González, environmental manager with Costa Rica’s National System of Conservation Areas (SINAC).
Other proposed solutions include increasing roadside visibility by cutting down tall grasses and installing fence lines and speed bumps throughout the highway.
As disheartening as numbers of roadkill are, these kinds of efforts are making a difference—especially wildlife crossings and reforestation that aims to reconnect habitats.
The next item on the habitat connectivity checklist is biological corridors, launched as a nationwide conservation strategy by the Costa Rican government nearly 20 years ago. Forty-four defined corridors cover nearly 1.6 million hectares of habitat.
The corridors seek to connect environmentally sensitive areas for animals to seamlessly mobilize without crossing into unfamiliar, risky grounds like highways.
Patches of forest dotted with cities and small roads in between, variations in climate, and animal behavioral patterns play a deciding role in establishing the scope of biological corridors.
Costa Rica’s Pagos por Servicios Ambientales (payments for environmental services) program was created to give farmers and other landowners an opportunity to conserve forest by compensating them for the ecosystem services they preserve.
But Irene Chen at the Monteverde Institute said farmers are committed beyond the program’s remuneration. “They are doing it because they care and observe the benefits of having trees in their properties,” including shade, restored soils and increased biodiversity.
The Monteverde Institute is offering farmers fruit or edible trees for reforestation, which in turn helps animals that rely on fruit trees. One example is Ocotea monteverdensis, an avocado tree species the emblematic quetzal bird with its iridescent blue-green feathers and flamboyant tail selects to inhabit.
“Right now, we have planted around 6,000 trees, which are also endangered species in Monteverde,” Chen says as she walks into the institute’s plant nursery. Inside the mesh enclosure, every table is lined up with trays containing separate bags of growing shoots that will be transplanted and hopefully become trees one day.
When it comes to the driving forces behind declining wildlife populations, ecotourism can’t take all the blame. While growing rates of nature-loving visitors have required more roads and other infrastructure that can harm animals, tourism has also had a positive impact on wildlife.
Raúl Obregón Hernández, tour guide at El Arenal Volcano, recalls La Fortuna’s lackluster landscape years before ecotourism boomed throughout the country.
“I remember all these places in La Fortuna used to be big pastoral areas. In the ‘70s and ‘80s, La Fortuna used to be 98% agriculture, and I remember that by the ‘90s to 2000, there were no sloths, monkeys, toucans, or snakes.”
With 2.6 million tourists visiting Costa Rica every year, forest conservation garnered mainstream attention. Better sustainable practices had to be adopted to sustain the green gold and continue attracting visitors from around the globe.
Brought together, humans and animals have developed a symbiotic-like relationship. Mammals, birds, and reptiles, mostly oblivious to the reverence they are subjected to by tourists, offer a source of excitement, curiosity, and income. In return, they receive broader habitat areas and widespread conservation culture.
To Obregón Hernández, the word “ecotourism” can represent people at their best. Eco represents the places that need protection and tourism, the people that come protect them. Along with sloth plushies, handmade jewelry and various forms of tropical souvenirs, tourists might also return home with a newfound sense of responsibility for wildlife.
The road to restoring connectivity in natural habitats in Costa Rica and the world is long and winding. But every day brings another underpass or monkey bridge to protect our wild animals, including every kinkajou on its way home.
