The secrets of the Amazon's most mysterious river |
Legend has it that the Santiago river used to swallow the canoe of anyone trying to explore it. Now an indigenous community is discovering surprising species in its waters.
We stepped into the wooden canoe bobbing on the murky water of the Santiago river, ready to visit one of the Amazon region's least-known ecosystems. Until very recently, scientists didn't even know which fish inhabited this part of the river, as it had never been studied. Now, after a two-day journey by bus and truck from Quito, Ecuador's capital, photographer Karen Toro and I were getting close to our destination: Kaputna, an indigenous community that has discovered new fish species here.
Surrounded by virgin jungle, where jaguars, peccaries and pumas still roam, Kaputna is a settlement on the banks of the Santiago river of 145 inhabitants who are members of the Shuar, one of the 11 indigenous nations living in the Ecuadorian Amazon. While Ecuador is considered a hotspot for freshwater fish, scientists warned in 2021 that the lack of data on its fish was "staggering", and that there was an urgent need for more research.
A group of Kaputna residents has helped fill this gap, discovering a wealth of hidden fish flitting through the river, camouflaged by shades of brown and silver, using specially adapted mouths to feed off its submerged rocks. Thanks to monitoring efforts carried out between 2021 and 2022, combining traditional and scientific knowledge, the indigenous community managed to identify 144 species of fish in the Santiago waters. Five of them are known from other countries, but have never been found in Ecuador before. One species is still being studied and could be a completely new to science, according to biologists participating in the research. Kaputna fishermen such as Germán Narankas are listed as co-authors of the scientific publication that reports these findings.
"Their knowledge of the territory is essential for discovering new species," Jonathan Valdiviezo, a biologist who provided support during the sample analysis stage, says of the fishermen's findings. For Fernando Anaguano, main author of the study and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) biologist that accompanied Kaputna during the whole process, the study marks a landmark change in how scientists work with, and acknowledge, local contributors. "This custom of recognising the work of local people is not usually seen in scientific publications," he says.
Local legends say that, in the days before motorboats, people who rowed down the lower part of the Santiago River disappeared. A hole "swallowed" the canoes, and strangers never made it to the community. That is where the name Kaputna, or "area where the river is fast-flowing", comes from, according to locals.
To get there, it took us a 10-hour drive from Quito, the Ecuadorian capital, to Tiwintza, an Amazonian town on the border with Peru, where we stayed overnight. In the morning, Germán Narankas, a Kaputna fisherman, was waiting for us at the Tiwintza bus terminal, waving at us and smiling. He was easy to spot among the crowd because of the fishing net he carried on his back. "Today is going to be hell. It hasn't rained in three days", and the heat was going to be atrocious, he warned us, as he rolled down his sleeves to avoid getting sunburned. At 09:00, the temperature was already 95F (35C).
After buying food, gasoline for his canoe's motor, and water for our stay in Kaputna – which has neither shops, nor roads – we rented a truck and set off on a 40-minute journey to the port of Peñas on the Santiago River. There, Narankas' tethered canoe waited for us, moving slightly with the river's strong current. Canoes equipped with gasoline-powered engines, known as peque-peques, are the only means of transportation to reach Kaputna, and the Santiago River is its only connection to other towns.
The murky water prevented us from seeing the bottom of the river, as if it were protecting the life hidden down there. In calmer sections, we relaxed and enjoyed the lush scenery, but in rougher sections the water turned choppy, rocked the canoe and made us uneasily remember the legend of the disappearing boats. Dodging some logs that had fallen into the river, we eventually arrived at the entrance to Kaputna. The settlement itself was........