“We have chosen this area because, being very large and uninhabited, in the future it could become a first-rate natural space.
Surely outside of Scandinavia there is no area in Europe with such a small population density, two inhabitants per square kilometer, the same as that of Mongolia”.
This is how Deli Saavedra, Head of Landscapes at Rewilding Europe, explains the first reason why this organization has selected lands in Guadalajara, Cuenca and Teruel to finance a great experiment to promote wildlife.
The project, baptized as Sistema Ibérico Sur (Iberian Highlands, in English), is presented this Wednesday in Cuenca and integrates different pilot actions to favor the return of nature and the local economy, such as the introduction of tauro cattle (a bovine breed created like the ancient aurochs), within a much larger area of 850,000 hectares.
This is the tenth project in Europe and the first in Spain of Rewilding Europe, a foundation registered in the Netherlands to promote the recovery of wildlife on the continent.
As Saavedra adds, the second reason for choosing these lands "is that they are one of the few where other uses of livestock can be demonstrated on a large scale today."
According to this representative of the Dutch organization, until now cattle have been used to produce meat or milk, but they want to recover these animals as one more piece of the ecosystems, in addition to reducing the risk of fires and favoring the accumulation of carbon. .
"We don't call them cattle, they are large herbivores working for the ecosystems," says Saavedra.
Specimens of tauros, cattle that reach 1,000 kilos, in Frías de Albarracín. Deli Saavedra
In order to carry out this initiative, the Dutch foundation has created Rewilding Spain, a matrix registered in the registry of foundations under state jurisdiction as the Spanish Renaturalization Foundation.
As detailed by the general secretary of this organization, the lawyer Mara Zamora, this Sistema Ibérica Sur project has initial funding of 2.7 million for the first three years, but it is planned for a much longer term.
The money comes from the Dutch foundation, through two funding sources: a British program for large-scale conservation projects, the
Endangered Landscapes Programme
, and a Cartier watch brand foundation.
The project in Spain contemplates various pilot actions in scattered locations, in which the promoters pay either for the rental of pastures or to avoid forest exploitation that damages well-preserved areas.
These actions are planned at points in three natural areas, the Alto Tajo and Serranía de Cuenca natural parks, and the Montes Universales hunting reserve, a huge area that together covers an area of 850,000 hectares.
According to the general secretary of Rewilding Spain, 80% of the land where the pilot actions are located are located in Castilla-La Mancha (in the provinces of Guadalajara and Cuenca) and 20% in Aragón (in the province of Teruel). .
More specifically, the planned plan includes the introduction of herds of horses in Mazarete and Villanueva de Alcorón (both municipalities in Guadalajara) and of tauro bovines in Frías de Albarracín (Teruel), as well as continuing with those of the black vulture that are already are being carried out in the area, through an aviary located in Peralejos de las Truchas (Guadalajara).
The demolition of at least one obsolete dam on the Cabrillas River and payment to forest owners to prevent the felling of stands of mature forests of great value are also contemplated.
A horse in the Dehesa de Solanillos, in Mazarete (Guadalajara). JUAN CARLOS MUÑOZ ROBREDO
"In Rewilding Europe we work in large landscapes, but obviously it is impossible to work in all this space at the same time, what we do is launch pilots, actions that are always demonstrations for the neighbors," says Saavedra, who ensures that the project It also aims to promote tourism and economic activities that help combat depopulation.
“We neither impose anything nor do we want livestock or agriculture to disappear where it continues to be, the problem is that there are many places where there is no longer any of this, that is why we are seeking agreements with municipalities and entities such as the Ministry of Sustainable Development of the Junta de Castilla-La Mancha.
In the case of the tauros, at the start of the project it is expected to incorporate a herd of 24 animals that already lives in the Frías de Albarracín area, introduced 17 months ago by the manager of the La Maleza Iberian fauna park, Ricardo Almazán.
"After 17 months the farm is already changing a lot, because the taurus is an animal that eats lignified vegetation, bushes with woody stems, literally eats wood," says Almazán, emphasizing the importance of this to fight fires.
“A beef cow here has to be fed for eight or nine months a year, otherwise it will die.
These Taurus take advantage of the natural resource by themselves, feeding on what they find, whatever the weather, without ever getting sick.
As detailed by this pioneer in the release of these large herbivores in the area, the taurus is a breed of bovine in whose creation another Dutch foundation, Stichting Taurus, has intervened, crossing different types of European cows (among them, three Spanish, the limia, the sayaguesa and the pajuna del sur) to look for the greatest similarity with the extinct aurochs.
"The taurus is an animal that reaches 1,000 kilos, is about 1.80 meters tall at the withers (where the neck begins) and has its horns always upwards, as the uro had," Almazán emphasizes.
"It's not a dangerous animal at all, but Taurus projects can thrive in places empty of humans, because a 1,000-kilogram bug is scary."
Specimen of black vulture, the largest bird that flies in the skies of the country.Juan Carlos Muñoz / Rewilding Europe
Last year, a group of scientists warned of the risks of introducing the current European bison, which had never lived here before, in some parts of the Peninsula.
On this, Almazán defends that "in this case it cannot be said that it is an exotic species, since the taurus is a bovine with current European cow genes, especially adapted to European ecosystems, and what is intended is to recover a key species that lived here and that we got rid of”.
For the mayor of Frías de Albarracín, Benito Lacasa, "managing these animals is not difficult, but it is not easy either."
"Although we have a small population in these mountains, there are still people in these municipalities, there are farmlands, sheep farming, wood harvesting and other activities, so the Tauruses must be compatible with all these uses, it is not about taking into account exclusivity the space for these animals, in addition these are mounts of public utility”.
As the mayor points out, what has been done is to delimit an area of about 500 hectares near the municipality so that it does not interfere with other activities.
“We have done this with two purposes: one scientific, to see the changes that these animals produce in the landscape, in the pastures, in the insects;
and the other tourist,
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