The Blue Macaw Perched Among the Guai Guao Pepper

On January 25th, Salomé Piza and Michel Salas walked through the reserve's scrubland beneath one of those clear skies that make the green of the banana groves seem to glow from within. At the first stop along the trail, among the broad leaves of Musaceae and the green tufts of bledo — that Amaranthus retroflexus which grows without anyone having planted it — they found what made the whole walk worthwhile: an Ara ararauna, the blue-and-yellow macaw, perched in quiet stillness among the foliage. She is in the process of rehabilitation, and that day she let herself be filmed without hurry, as if she understood there was no need to rush. A few meters further north, the forest thickened. Salomé and Michel documented a Fabaceae with dry pods hanging brown from the branches — species still pending confirmation — and a shrub heavy with fruit at every stage of ripeness: green, orange, black. It was Capsicum frutescens, the ají guai guao, as the local campesinos have always called it around here. With that final record, they closed out the day, the reserve revealing, little by little, what it holds in keeping.