Support for NPR and the following message come from Bowlen Branch.

Change your sleep with Bowlen Branch's airy blankets, cloud-like duvays, and breathable sheets.

Feel the difference with 15% off your first order at bollandbranch.com with code NPR.

Exclusions apply. See site for details.

You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.

Hey, shortwavers, it's Regina Barber.

And the story I have for you starts in northern Peru, where the Amazon basin meets the Andes Mountains.

The Altamayo is this lush valley surrounded by mountains.

You have a high diversity of different soil types, different vegetation

types, and microclimates as you change in elevation. And that creates this really dynamic and

vibrant mosaic with all different kinds of life. That's Tron Larson. He's an ecologist at Conservation

International, a non-profit organization based in Arlington, Virginia. He's an ecologist at Conservation International, a nonprofit organization

based in Arlington, Virginia. He says that this area in Peru straddles two preserves,

the Altamile Protection Forest and the Cordillera Escalera Regional Conservation Area.

And it's being deforested. It's also under threat of more deforestation.

Because all that lushness makes it a great place for growing major agricultural products like pineapples, coffee, and chocolate.

There's also significant human presence. It's very much a human-dominated landscape.

Trond and a team of 12 Peruvian scientists led a 38-day expedition into the area in the summer of 2022, guided by

experts from the local indigenous tribe, the Awa-Hoon. And along the way, they set up data sensors to

complete the survey. The goal was to create a management plan that benefits both the local

people and the land, based on a survey of all the local plant and animal life.

The very first night after arriving, you know my dinner down, and I was so eager to get out

...