established in 1988

Tierraleja Private Natural Reserve 

04º38´21,49¨N, 73º55´53,76¨W

Tierraleja Private Nature Reserve & Bird Sanctuary is the result of an idea that became a passion initiated in 1988, while in a drizzly morning hike through the mountains, hidden in the fog at 10.500 ft altitude we discovered a most wonderful and mysterious place, pristinely conserved and full of wildlife. Creeks with sparkling clear water surrounded by shinny mosses, ferns and bamboo. Hummingbirds pollinating orchids and puyas, bands of parrots screaming loud while flying over, bees buzzing over lush grassy flowerbeds and ferns and through the dwarf canopy of laurel and encenillo trees adorned with bright red bromeliads, weaving animal trails and tracks on the forest floor and sounds of hidden birds and close by water trickle. All seen through an enveloping slow moving and ever changing light mist. Awesome humbling surprise to experience such a wild, remote and lively forest yet so close to the great city of concrete and civilization.

Great shock having learned from a local peasant who was passing by, that the area had been subdivided into small lots and belonged to various potato growing owners who had destined it for clearing and potato planting. From that moment on, the focus was in acquiring those lands and save them from Homo sapiens´s predatory action. It was a lengthy uphill process due to the need to identify the topography, survey the land and later find each of the different owners, approach them and convince them to close a fair deal. Of course they would only sell if the already cleared areas where included. The decision was made to move forward and plan a sustainable farming use for the cleared areas while reforesting and conserving the rest.

Today, 30 years later Tierraleja is preserving 500+ acres of high andean forest and paramo habitat full of water sources and biodiversity. On the cleared areas a small sustainable carbon fixing re-generative grazing grass-fed beef cattle operation is running. A confortable lodge for visitors featuring spectacular views, observation decks and bird feeders was built and hiking trails cleared. In 2014, attracted by the high degree of conservation, the Universidad de los Andes in collaboration with the Alexander Von Humboldt Institute deployed an expedition to find and classify most of the plants, birds, amphibians and insects found on the reserve. 59 species of birds including many hummingbirds and 91 species of plants were certified. After 10 days of exploration it was a very pleasant reward to have found a new and previously unclassified species of bromeliad from the Puya family, endemic only to the reserve, and now named Puya loca ( Madriñán 2014), as well as a rare frog from the Pristimantis family as clear indicators to the high degree of conservation.

The scientific name name Puya loca, is derived from the family Puya and the word “loca” which means crazy in Spanish, and was decided since it was so unusual and crazy to have found a previously undetected bromeliad so close to the urban area.

The origin of the name Tierraleja? When I was hiking and asking for directions on that 1989 morning hike, before arriving to the area, I crossed paths with a mid aged lady who was walking down from the mountain picking berries and when asked if she knew any forest land for sale close by, she said to me, “ Pues tengo una tierra, pero es leja”, well I do have a piece of land, but it is far. Many years would go by searching the proper name for the new dream land, and green and water and air and nature and so many other descriptive names and combinations came by before I realized the name had been given to me at the very start by this good lady whom later sold her piece of “tierra leja” far land to me for conservation. We remain friends and she still picks berries in the area.

So the name Tierraleja is composition of the two words: “Tierra”, meaning land in spanish and “leja” a popular jargon for far in spanish, hence Tierra leja = Far land, Tierraleja=Farland.