In the Maya rainforest, logging and hunting don’t always mean wildlife loss

Deep in Guatemala’s Maya rainforest, a team led by Washington State University researchers captured more than just photos of jaguars, tapirs and ocelots. They also captured a rare success story: a way for humans and wildlife to share a forest without destroying it.

In a new study published in Conservation Biology, scientists from WSU and the Wildlife Conservation Society found that a community-managed forest in Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve supports a rich variety of wildlife. The area, where residents legally log timber and hunt for subsistence, harbors medium-to-large mammals and birds in numbers comparable to those in a strictly protected national park and a wildlife preserve.

But it’s nuanced. The cameras also revealed that some vulnerable species, like white-lipped peccaries, tapirs and great curassows, avoid areas with high human access, showing how subtle, “cryptic” disturbances can ripple through even an apparently intact forest.

“Our goal was to see how different conservation strategies, strict protection versus managed use, are really working for the wildlife that live there,” said Daniel Thornton, an associate professor at WSU’s School of the Environment and senior author on the study. “While our results show this wasn’t the case in Uaxactun, forests in many tropical regions can appear lush and healthy from above, even as their canopies conceal what’s known as an ’empty forest’—a landscape stripped of wildlife.”

To test this, study lead author and former WSU Ph.D. student Lucy Perera-Romero worked with local hunters and birders in the Uaxactun community forest and the neighboring Mirador-Rio Azul National Park and Dos Lagunas “Biotope” (Wildlife Preserve).

Over two dry seasons, they deployed an extensive grid of camera traps across about 1,500 square kilometers, aiming cameras at waterholes, roads and deep forest trails. With help from locals who knew the terrain and animal signs intimately, the team amassed thousands of images representing 26 mammal and bird species.

What they found was multi-faceted. At the community level, both the managed forest and the protected area supported similar species richness and occupancy. This suggests that the Uaxactun community’s careful stewardship, backed by Forest Stewardship Council certification, has preserved a mostly intact wildlife community even while supporting human livelihoods through selective logging, gathering and regulated hunting.

But some species painted a more sobering picture. Vulnerable animals like the Baird’s tapir, along with heavily hunted species such as the great curassow and white-lipped peccary, were less likely to be found in areas near the Uaxactun village that are frequently used by humans. Instead, they retreated to more remote, less disturbed parts of the forest. By contrast, smaller, more adaptable species, and even ocelots, were sometimes more abundant closer to people, likely benefiting from reduced competition or predation.

Perera-Romero recalled one striking moment: a camera placed at an isolated waterhole, an oasis in the parched dry season, captured an image of a jaguar hunting an ocelot, likely the first photographic evidence of such behavior. “It shows just how much is still happening under the canopy that we don’t see,” she said.

That “understory” is critical for more than just animal life. Large mammals disperse seeds, maintain plant diversity and help forests store more carbon, which in turn supports global climate stability. If the forest empties of animals, it becomes less resilient and productive.

The findings also have immediate implications for conservation policy. The Uaxactun community used preliminary results from this study to help renew its integrated forest concession, demonstrating that its management practices maintain biodiversity.

“It’s a model for how communities can responsibly use and protect tropical forests, especially when compared to the extensive defaunation that occurs when communities practice cattle ranching instead of forest stewardship,” Thornton said.

Uaxactun’s success stems from more than just location, according to Roan McNab, WCS Guatemala program director at the time of the study. Its proximity to two national parks helps buffer it from threats, but equally important are the community’s deep-rooted forest traditions, the growth of its management organization, a fierce commitment to keeping out external actors, and investments in education. The community is also a member of the Association of Forest Communities of Peten (ACOFOP), a partnership that strengthens its political voice and access to government support.

“Uaxactun shows that when local people have the resources, the rights, and the will, community-based forest management can sustain robust populations of wildlife and function as one of the planet’s most resilient conservation strategies,” McNab said.

Moving forward, the study underscores the need for ground-based monitoring to understand what happens below the canopy, complementing satellite images that only reveal the forest’s surface. It also shows that conservation doesn’t have to mean excluding people entirely. With smart rules and continued vigilance, humans and wildlife can coexist—even in the heart of a rainforest.

“These forests are beautiful, but also fragile,” Perera-Romero said. “The more we know about what’s happening inside them, the better we can protect them for everyone, people and jaguars alike.”