Its time for some introductions, so the primary question begs, what exactly is a Bofedale? Beyond
being a cool sounding name, Bofedales are in actual fact rapid peat forming
plant communities of the Andes, which grow in inundated terrain forming dense
mound like structures to survive the extreme conditions of high ultraviolet
radiation, daily frosts, strong winds and regular fluctuations of the water
table that is the environment of the high Andes. Basically they live where
other plants don’t dare to tread.
Being plants and living where life is scarce, means they are
an oasis of food in the Andean wilds and therefore an important habitat for
many other species. Humans included.
According to archeological estimates, humans settled in the Andes roughly
6-7000 yrs ago, having encountered the high productivity pasture of the
Bofedales and deciding it was to their liking, they set about domesticating the
wild camelids and in effect produced the llamas and alpacas with which we are
familiar today.
The people of the Andes also did a lot more than that. Not
content with the natural extent of the Bofedales, they set about hand digging
trenches, diverting mountain streams and aquifers, inundating valley bottoms and
mountain slopes with the cascading streams of the Andes. What was the end
result of this grand anthropogenic experiment? A greening of the Andean
deserts, the spread of crucial life supporting systems and the development of
an extensive pastoral system capable of supporting the people of the high
Andes.
The practice of diverting streams to develop or enhance
Bofedale pasture is still utilized today, as these images from google earth
illustrate:
This last image reveals the complex morphology of a Bofedale
and what is likely a herd of grazing llama or alpaca, represented by white specks on the Bofedale surface:
My research is focused on understanding the complex Bofedale
morphology and the environmental factors driving its development.
