Parque Municipal y Área Natural de Manejo Integrado Gran Mojos: Mapped Protected Landscapes

Gran Mojos is best known as the most important nesting stronghold of the Blue-throated Macaw (Ara glaucogularis), known locally as the Paraba Barba Azul. This macaw is endemic to the Bolivian Beni and is considered critically endangered, with an estimated total population of around 250 individuals, and the park's extensive floodplain forests are believed to hold the largest known nesting concentration of the species. Beyond its flagship macaw, the protected area stands out for combining a strict municipal park core with a large integrated management zone that supports indigenous communities. This dual structure, along with the area's position in the central Mamoré floodplain and its connection to a wider Andean foothills conservation corridor, gives Gran Mojos regional importance for Amazonian wetland conservation in Bolivia.

Gran Mojos is a relatively recent addition to Bolivia's system of protected areas. It was created on 25 February 2017 through a declaration by the municipal government of Loreto, in the Beni Department. The decision emerged from an extended period of scientific and institutional groundwork focused on the conservation needs of the Llanos de Moxos floodplain.

The technical justification for the protected area was developed by Cibioma, the Centro de Investigación en Biodiversidad y Medio Ambiente (Center for Research on Biodiversity and Environment), in partnership with the Fundación para la Conservación de los Loros de Bolivia (CLB, Foundation for the Conservation of Parrots of Bolivia). These institutions produced an integral diagnostic study for the proposed area, which documented the presence of around 463 species across 316 genera and identified a range of threatened and endemic species requiring urgent protection.

Of these, the Blue-throated Macaw stood out as the central driver for formal protection. Considered endemic to the Bolivian Beni and critically endangered, with an estimated total population of only around 250 individuals, the species became the symbolic focus of the effort to create a municipal-level conservation regime. Its most important known nesting concentration lies within what is now Gran Mojos.

The final design of the protected area reflects a compromise between strict conservation and the reality of long-standing indigenous settlement in the floodplain. Rather than imposing a single uniform reserve category across the entire municipal territory, the 2017 declaration defined a core municipal park area of primary forest, complemented by a much larger Área Natural de Manejo Integrado that recognizes the continued presence and land use of approximately fourteen indigenous communities within the broader landscape.

The landscape of Gran Mojos is defined by the great riverine plain of central Bolivia, one of the signature landforms of the Llanos de Moxos ecoregion. The protected area lies entirely within the floodplain of the central Mamoré River, where seasonal and multi-year cycles of flooding and drying shape the terrain, vegetation, and wildlife patterns. This floodplain mosaic combines gallery forests, palm-dominated wetlands, grasslands, slow-moving channels, oxbow lakes, and patches of more elevated tierra firme that remain above the highest water levels.

Within this broader floodplain setting, the strict Parque Municipal zone preserves about 85,000 hectares of primary forest, where the canopy is largely intact and human influence has been comparatively limited. Surrounding it, the much larger Área Natural de Manejo Integrado extends across roughly 495,430 hectares of similarly low-lying terrain, supporting both natural ecosystems and the resources on which local communities depend.

The regional geography is notable for the protected area's position along a major latitudinal connectivity axis. To the south, Gran Mojos borders the Isiboro-Sécure Indigenous Territory and National Park (Tipnis), and to the north it connects with the Ibare-Mamoré Municipal Protected Area. Within the wider landscape, Gran Mojos also forms part of the Amboró-Madidi Corridor, a chain of reserves stretching from the last Andean foothills toward the western Amazon, linking lowland floodplains to montane forest environments further west. Nearby aquatic landmarks of the broader area include Laguna Bolivia, Laguna de Araré, and Laguna Aquiles, which contribute to the region's reputation as a network of seasonally flooded lakes and slow-moving waters.

Gran Mojos sits within the Llanos de Moxos, one of the most extensive wetland complexes in South America and a globally significant seasonal-flood ecosystem. The ecoregion is characterized by dynamic alternations between aquatic and terrestrial phases, with extensive palm swamps, seasonally flooded grasslands, gallery forests along rivers, and patches of higher forest on slightly elevated ground.

The protected area's primary forest core represents one of the more intact expressions of this floodplain forest mosaic. Its structure and connectivity with surrounding protected areas, especially the Amboró-Madidi Corridor, contribute to ecological processes that span from the Andes foothills to the lowland Amazon basin. These processes include seasonal migrations of fish and other aquatic species, the flooding and recession of vast grasslands, and movements of large mammals that depend on intact forest corridors.

The biodiversity assessment that informed the park's creation identified roughly 463 species distributed across 316 genera, suggesting a relatively high species diversity for an individual protected area in the Beni. While this figure encompasses plants, insects, fish, and other groups, it underscores the ecological richness of the floodplain mosaic, where aquatic, semi-aquatic, and terrestrial habitats meet within a relatively compact geographic frame.

Wildlife is the central focus of Gran Mojos and was the principal motivation for the protected area's creation. A diagnostic study by Cibioma and the Fundación para la Conservación de los Loros de Bolivia documented around 463 species across 316 genera, placing the area among the more biodiverse protected areas of the Beni Department.

The defining species of the park is the Blue-throated Macaw (Ara glaucogularis), known locally as the Paraba Barba Azul. This macaw is endemic to the Bolivian Beni and is currently classified as critically endangered. An estimated total population of only around 250 individuals remains, and Gran Mojos holds what is considered the largest known nesting concentration of the species. The area's mature primary forest provides the large tree cavities that the macaws depend on for breeding, making the protection of these forests central to any conservation effort for the species.

The park is also considered important for other large and ecologically significant species of the Bolivian lowlands. The jaguar is recognized as one of the protected area's target species, reflecting the importance of large, contiguous forest habitat for apex predators. The Amazon river dolphin, locally called bufeo, is another symbol of the park, anchoring its identity in the region's distinctive freshwater environment. Beyond these flagship species, the park's mosaic of forest, floodplain, and aquatic habitats supports a wide array of birds, fish, mammals, reptiles, and invertebrates characteristic of the Llanos de Moxos, several of which are also considered threatened or endemic to Bolivia.

Gran Mojos was established in 2017 as a direct conservation response to catastrophic threats facing species endemic to the Bolivian Beni. Its creation reflects an explicit recognition that regional and even global survival of several species depends on protecting the floodplain forests and aquatic ecosystems of the central Mamoré.

The protected area was specifically designed to secure the most important known nesting area of the Blue-throated Macaw, a species whose total wild population is estimated at around 250 individuals and which is considered critically endangered. By placing roughly 85,000 hectares of primary forest under strict municipal park protection and surrounding it with a much larger integrated management area, the park's management strategy aims to keep breeding habitat secure while allowing traditional community land use to continue in the wider landscape.

Conservation planning for Gran Mojos was supported by scientific institutions including Cibioma and the Fundación para la Conservación de los Loros de Bolivia, whose diagnostic work generated the species checklist and identified the major threats and priorities. The park also sits within the Amboró-Madidi Corridor, contributing to a broader effort to maintain ecological connectivity between Andean foothill forests and Amazonian lowlands. By addressing both threatened species and the integrity of the floodplain system as a whole, Gran Mojos occupies an important place in Bolivia's contemporary conservation framework.

Gran Mojos was created within a landscape that has long been inhabited by indigenous peoples, and the protected area's integrated management structure explicitly acknowledges this reality. Approximately fourteen indigenous communities live within the larger Área Natural de Manejo Integrado, where traditional patterns of land use, fishing, hunting, and small-scale forest management continue alongside conservation goals.

The name Gran Mojos itself reflects the broader cultural and ecological significance of the Llanos de Moxos region, which has been associated with complex indigenous societies, sophisticated earthwork landscapes, and centuries of human-environment interaction in the floodplains of the Mamoré and its tributaries. The creation of a municipal park that combines strict forest protection with integrated management of inhabited zones is, in part, a reflection of this long relationship between people and the wetlands.

Regional conservation efforts associated with Gran Mojos also involve local organizations and foundations, such as the Fundación para la Conservación de los Loros de Bolivia, which links scientific research, community engagement, and the protection of culturally symbolic species like the Paraba Barba Azul. The interplay between contemporary conservation practice and the region's wider indigenous and community heritage is a defining element of the park's identity.

Gran Mojos stands out as one of Bolivia's most strategically positioned lowland protected areas, both in terms of its location at the meeting point of major floodplain ecosystems and its role within the Amboró-Madidi Corridor. Its dual structure, with a strict primary-forest municipal park at its core and a much larger integrated management zone surrounding it, allows conservation objectives to coexist with the presence of indigenous communities in the broader landscape.

The park's single most distinctive highlight is its importance for the Blue-throated Macaw, the species that effectively catalyzed the protected area's creation and continues to anchor its identity. Additional highlights include the area's relevance for jaguars and Amazon river dolphins, the documented richness of its flora and fauna, and its networked position between Tipnis to the south and the Ibare-Mamoré Protected Area to the north.

The character of a visit to Gran Mojos is strongly shaped by the seasonal flooding cycle of the central Mamoré River floodplain. During the wet season, large parts of the landscape become inundated, transforming forests, grasslands, and roads into an extensive shallow-water environment. Water levels rise, rivers expand into surrounding lowlands, and aquatic wildlife, including fish and river dolphins, becomes more visible across the area.

In the dry season, water levels recede, exposing beaches, mudflats, and grasslands, while concentrating wildlife around remaining water bodies. Terrestrial species such as macaws, other parrots, and large mammals become easier to observe as they gather at roost sites, nesting trees, and residual water sources. For visitors particularly interested in birdlife, including the Blue-throated Macaw, timing a visit to coincide with periods when nesting activity is concentrated in mature primary forest is generally advantageous, though exact seasonal patterns are best confirmed locally.