Bibliographic citations
Delgado, S., (2019). Estudio de la distribución geográfica y ecológica del "suri" (Rhea pennata) en el área de conservación regional Vilacota Maure (Tacna, Perú) [Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú]. http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12404/14267
Delgado, S., Estudio de la distribución geográfica y ecológica del "suri" (Rhea pennata) en el área de conservación regional Vilacota Maure (Tacna, Perú) []. PE: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú; 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12404/14267
@misc{sunedu/2658658,
title = "Estudio de la distribución geográfica y ecológica del "suri" (Rhea pennata) en el área de conservación regional Vilacota Maure (Tacna, Perú)",
author = "Delgado Pease, Santiago Enrique",
publisher = "Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú",
year = "2019"
}
Overgrazing dynamics, the construction of hamlets, illegal poaching, amongst other facts, had driven a very singular specie of andean bird to the brink of extinction in the national territory. This bird is the “suri” (Rhea pennata D’Orbigny, 1834). This is a specie of non-flying bird that occurs in the highlands of the South American Altiplano, with an average size of little more than one metre. It is known that the specie can present less than 400 individuals within the national territory’s limits. Akin to the African ostrich, to the Australian emu, and the New Zealand cassowary, the genus Rhea includes the biggest birds of the entire continent. The first National Suri Census allowed to know how endangered the specie was within our country. Henceforth, the conscientious implementation of regional politics, like the implementation of the Regional Conservation Area of Vilacota Maure, had allowed to make progresses in what refers to conservation: a very important portion of the population of this specie is placed within the already mentioned natural protected area. Although the mentioned efforts to preserve R. pennata from the extinction, it is very pertinent to encourage the investigations that may allow to identify the distribution parameters of this specie, in order to help to achieve its conservation, that it may avoid the extinction of such a peculiar bird in the Peruvian territory. The present investigation aims to determine the actual situation, both ecological and geographical, within the Regional Conservation Area of Vilacota Maure; to identify the way human populations may act as a limitation of distribution of the “suri”; and, by the usance of the Maximum Entropy Coefficient (MaxEnt), estimate the potential distribution of this specie within the Regional Conservation Area. Notwithstanding the efforts made, there are still in existence grazing dynamics within the limits of the Regional Conservation Area of Vilacota Maure, by which this specie is still menaced. The population centres are placed very close to the areas in which Rhea pennata can observe a better distribution, due to -setting an example- their closure to the “bofedales” (sing. “bofedal”, i.e., Andean wetland), that the studied specie requires to obtain the vegetation on which it feeds, and obtain the water it drinks. The studied specie, also, shuns mankind, and prefers to stay far from it. This apparent interespecific competition may entail an impediment to the efforts made conscientiously by the Regional Government. With populations that are distributed by the altoandean regions of Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, and Peru, Rhea is the sole and only genus of the Struthionidae family that occurs in the American continent, containing the species R. americana and R. pennata. Rhea pennata is a specie that, within the national limits, bases its distribution in the highest provinces of the regions of Puno, Tacna, and Moquegua. According to the chronist Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, this specie used to develop its distribution in many places of the Altiplano, and he mentions that it was called “suri” by the ancestral populations. In addition, he mentions that this specie was important due to its ceremonial uses: its feathers were used to weave ceremonial caps; and upon its claws, bill, grease, and entrails were attributed mystical qualities. It is a specie that was reverenced, cared, and respected by the prehispanic cultures, and which extinction is worthwhile to be avoided.
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