Julia Silveira

Seed collection is a vital step for ecological restoration in the processes conducted by the BJF. It guarantees the supply of seeds both for the nursery and for the direct seeding restoration technique.

The first step is to analyze the region’s native vegetation, identify the species present and their ecological behavior. Which species grow faster? What species participate in community restructuring after any disturbance (such as falling trees after windstorms or fires)? When we know the species, we can look for additional information in specialized literature.

With this knowledge, it is possible to determine the phenology of each spacies, that is, the time of year when fruits and seeds are produced.

In a new field trip, we identify the healthiest individuals of each species, collect their geographic coordinates and general characteristics. It is important to have a minimum number of individuals to guarantee the genetic diversity of our seeds.

Thus, the seeds are collected from those cataloged individuals, always considering that we cannot collect all the seeds, so as not to compromise the reproduction of the trees.

The seeds thus harvested are processed and sent for storage or sowing.

Carlos Silva from Fazenda Santa Fe talks about the importance of the seed collection process:

Have a listen to this episode of the Tess to Sustainability Podcast, featuring one of the BJF Team Members Joel Boele!

Black Jaguar Foundation’s Joel Boele joined Tess to Sustainability for an insightful conversation on how you can contribute to sustainability and restoration efforts! Have a listen below:

We’re proud to welcome five new members to our Core Team! Please give a warm welcome to our newest team members: Norivania Diniz, Erivelto Carvalho, Kaleo Pereira, Clarissa Sciarra, and Michelle Bade! The first four members will join our team in Brazil, while Michelle will be supporting the Amsterdam office.

(From left to right) Erivelto is our new Field Coordinator, Michelle has started as our new Communications Coordinator, Kaleo will fill the position of Restoration Analyst, Clarissa is our new Geoprocessing Analyst, and Norivania is our new Seedlings Production Analyst. As the scale of our project grows, so does our team!

Click through the descriptions of our newest team members to get to know them better!

We are very excited to announce that the leveling of the land for our newest and largest nursery has begun!

Before starting the building of the infrastructure, we are currently in the process of clearing and levelling the land. This has to be done very carefully to ensure that there will be no water damage done to the nursery once it is up and running. Stay tuned for more updates on how the nursery construction progresses!

Take a tour around the nursery site!

In cooperation with Sam’s Tulips, based in The Netherlands, we were able to surprise some of our valued partners and sponsors just in time for the Easter Holiday! We partnered with Sam’s Tulips in this endeavor, as he aims to produce tulips with the smallest carbon footprint possible.

We spent all day on the Wednesday leading up to Easter Weekend, some of us in a car and others on a bike, traveling around the Netherlands and into Belgium to visit our partners and sponsors.

With each visit we personally delivered beautiful bouquets of tulips and an Easter card. We loved seeing the surprised faces of our unsuspecting friends, and might try and turn this idea into a long-lasting tradition!

Check out Tulpen van Sam’s Website and Instagram for more information!

In March, we embarked on a partnership with the Municipality and the Secretary of Environment (SEMA) of Santana do Araguaia, our focus area of restoration in the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor in the coming years. 

This important partnership will allow BJF to use all the terrain needed of our brand new nursery in Santana do Araguaia. The 3,6 ha terrain dedicated to us by the Municipality is within the city centre limits and just next to their future environmental park. The park will include a number of public facilities that are focused on the usage of natural resources, and meant to connect the Brazilian citizen to nature, such as a hiking trail and playground area. 

This is the Black Jaguar Foundation’s third and largest nursery so far! This nursery will be able to produce 500,000 seedlings a year, which will help restore the degraded areas around the Araguaia River and, most importantly, will become a hub of ecological restoration in the region, providing much needed jobs for the local community, a sustainable approach for the agricultural industry and environmental education for generations to come. 

This nursery will become a unique hub, where the agro-industry will take on the role as a carer of nature and biodiversity. At the nursery, the Agro-sector and Environmental movement will become one, demonstrating to both Brazil and the world that these sectors can indeed work together. In partnership with the Black Jaguar Foundation, the farmers will be able to show their care for the environment, and want to work within the Brazilian environmental regulations, by restoring their APPs to the natural habitat of the Cerrado and Amazon. This in turn will create a win-win-win partnership, and will show that farmers and nature can and will go hand-in-hand. We are very excited to work together with the Municipality and the Secretary of the Environment of Santana do Araguaia! 

A look at the making of the partnership between BJF and Municipality of Santana do Araguaia:

The more we restore, the more we learn about the species we use in our projects. In both of the biomes we work in (Amazon and Cerrado), tree biodiversity has one of the highest rates in the world. So, it is in our project’s best interest that we try to conserve as many species as possible. The process of adding a new species into our portfolio begins with a careful observation of the tree in its natural habitat. Following these observations and based on their results, we collect the corresponding seeds and set up a nursery trial with them. These tests will make it possible to determine germination rates and initial growth of the seedlings. 

A further trial is then carried out in the field to determine if the species is more useful for rebuilding the forest structure or if it will compose the biodiversity later. Experimentation will also tell us if this species can be used in other techniques, such as direct seeding. 

Since 2018, our main portfolio has consisted of 42 different tree species. In the last rainy season, however, we managed to add 11 new species to this portfolio. A very good example is the pequi tree (Caryocar brasiliense), a very important species native to the Cerrado and the fringes of the Amazon. 

In the past, difficulties in cultivation has stopped us from using it in our projects. Now, however, we have come up with strategies to overcome the challenges and bring it to more and more restoration sites. This increase in species will help increase the success and quality of our restoration projects, and will allow for even more species to be restored in the Amazon and Cerrado biomes!

– Written by our Project Coordinator Dimitrio Schievenin