Video by: Cusuko Fotografia The magnificence of the Turrialba Volcano in Costa Rica, one of the current active volcanoes in the country and the second highest sitting at 3,340 meters above sea level (10,958 ft.), is showcased in this video created by Costa Rican Iván Salazar Cruz from Cusuko Fotografia and featured in the Spanish version of National Geographic Magazine. The majority of the i...

Sadly, the problem is not new, the area of Crucitas in the North Zone of Costa Rica continues to be exploited by illegal gold miners who have caused incredible environmental damage. The area has suffered environmental damages since 2012 as a result of a failed mining project; back then, the damages were estimated in close to 10 million dollars mainly as a result of logging. The presence of g...

Photo Credit: Fundacion del Rio A team of 40 Costa Rican firefighters will travel to Nicaragua this Monday at 6 a.m. to offer their assistance in helping control the fire that is affecting the Indio Maiz Biological Reserve for several days now and that has already destroyed over 7,000 hectares of protected land. President Daniel Ortega declared yellow emergency. This Biological Reserve is t...

An unprecedented scientific expedition left from the Galapagos Island in Ecuador this past April 2 and will conclude April 13 when it arrives in Isla del Coco (Coco Island) in Costa Rica; the purpose of this expedition is to identify the marine migratory species that use this route and quantify their distribution, abundance and diversity of their predators. According to Zdenka Piskulich from th...

The activity at the Turrialba Volcano in Costa Rica just doesn’t stop, on April 1st, two significant eruptions took place early in the morning and carried on for close to 30 minutes. The biggest eruption was registered at 8:38 a.m. local time and the cameras located near the crater registered a column of ash that reached between 500-700 meters above the active crater. The activity at the volcan...

On March 28 the official arrival (arribada) of Olive Ridley sea turtles (Lepidochelys olivacea) began at the area known as Main Nesting Beach in Playa Ostional, Guanacaste, Costa Rica. The National System of Areas of Conservation is taking control and protection actions to avoid the illegal transportation and commerce of sea turtle eggs in these sites. Each olive ridley turtles can lay in a...

What happens in Costa Rica when a rescued wild animal is too injured to ever return to the wild, but is not at the end of its natural life? iRescue Animal Sanctuary steps in. And what a blessing that is for both the animals and the over-crowded animal sanctuaries throughout the country. The sad truth is that Costa Rican animal sanctuaries are overwhelmed by wild animals, many too injured or ha...

Costa Rica will evaluate its aquifers to minimize the future impacts of climate change and droughts and evaluate the availability of water through an alliance between the Ministry of Environment and Energy (MINAE) of Costa Rica and the Geological Service of the United States. The initiative “Mapping of the underground water resources in Costa Rica”, will be possible through the use of high tech...

Former President of Costa Rica (94-98), Jose Maria Figueres, took part in the World Ocean Summit in Cancun, Mexico at the beginning of March, in his position as co-president of the Pacific Ocean Assembly, an organization aimed at uniting Latin American countries around the goal of ocean conservation, and also as co-chair of Ocean Unite (along side Richard Branson). Figueres emphasized in an int...

Four Europeans, 3 native from the Netherlands and 1 from Belgium were detained Friday by Costa Rican authorities as suspects of extracting endemic miniature orchids from the Juan Castro Blanco National Park, located in the province of Alajuela between the counties of San Carlos, Zarcero and Rio Cuarto. In total 246 plans were extracted by the foreigners with the purpose of taking them to Europe...

The purchase and sale of 820,000 square meters (82 hectares) of páramo (tundra ecosystem) was signed yesterday, this land will not be preserved as part of the natural patrimony of Costa Ricans. Two properties of 47 and 35 hectares respectively, both in the sector of Prusia, close to the Irazu Volcano, these contain diverse vegetation with mixed oak forests, isolated trees of Quercus and Salvia...

Fishermen protested on Monday this week expressing their opposition to the  the resolution of the Constitutional Chamber  which annulled the trawling permits that had been issued by Costa Rican Fisheries and Aquaculture Institute (Incopesca); their pressure apparently paid off, as 35 members of congress approved in first debate a project that would allow trawling practices once again. The Governm...

Watch a video created by the the Observatory of Volcanic and Seismic Activity in Costa Rica (OVSICORI) which showcases the activity of the Turrialba Volcano in Cartago, Costa Rica, from January through March 2018. The strombolian (relatively mild) activity continues at this active volcano. The video shows samples of the “bombs” erupted by the volcano close to the crater, as well as the impres...

The Observatory of Volcanic and Seismic Activity in Costa Rica (OVSICORI) gave an update on the status of the Turrialba Volcano, confirming that in the past three days there have been no more ash emissions but it is emitting a passive but important flow of magmatic gases at high temperatures of 600⁰-800⁰C (1112⁰-1472⁰F). These gases originate from a body of magma reach in volatiles “which sugge...

NatGeo posted today a beautiful video (included below) of a baby sloth that was rescued in Costa Rica. The story behind this: The baby two-toed sloth was rescued in the area of Osa Peninsula, where an expat from Ohio, USA, Dirk Morgan, owner of Morgan’s Jungle Lodge, learned from guests about the sloth holding on to a rock and crying for help in the area known as Punta Tigre, they immediate...

At the beginning of this year scientists announced with excitement the reappearance of the Poas Volcano hot water lake, as a result of the rainfall in the area and the closing of the internal ducts of the volcano; however, just a few weeks later and in a matter of 12 days the lake dried out. The volcanologists started noticing the changes in the water level of the lake starting mid-February, an...

The Turrialba Volcano in Cartago, Costa Rica had for the past weeks presented a diminished seismic activity and also a decreased degassification; however, the volcano raised its voice again this March 7th when it entered an strombolian eruption phase (relatively mild blasts). The phase which began at 00:00 hours included the emission of gases, ashes and incandescent fragments of fresh lava whic...

March 3 was proclaimed by the United Nations as UN World Wildlife Day to celebrate and raise awareness of the world’s wild animals and plants; in commemoration of this day, Animal Rescue Zooave in Costa Rica, symbolically destroyed 200 animal cages. The activity took place at the Zooave in La Garita, Alajuela, many of the cages were accumulated by the animal rescue center over a certain period ...

Costa Rican NGO "Nicoya Peninsula Waterkeeper" demands a regulatory plan from the Puntarenas Municipality to ensure a sustainable development of the tourist areas of Santa Teresa, Mal Pais and Hermosa. A new aqueduct will soon be operational in the area of Cobano in Puntarenas, this project was created to solve some of the existing water-shortage problems that affect this region; however, neigh...

The Costa Rican government invests over U.S. $100 million a year in environmental protection according to information provided by Treasury, the Ministry of Environment and Energy and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (Cepal) in their study Estimation of Public Expense in Environmental Protection published this March 1st. The amount is equivalent to a 0.19% of the GNP, ...

The Municipality of San Jose, signed an agreement with Marviva Foundation through which they will support actions involving businesses and the general population to begin eliminating the use of single use plastic which represents 80% of the waste that is accumulated in the oceans. Concerned for the amount of waste that is generated in a daily basis and the repercussions this has in the environ...

Costa Rican company Florida Ice & Farm (FIFCO) celebrated in December last year the accomplishment of their goal to become the first mass consumption company in Costa Rica to be certified as carbon positive, now, the company celebrates another milestone as they become the first company in Latin America to receive the certification “Zero Waste to Landfill”. The certification, awarded by The Carb...

The Manuel Antonio National Park in Quepos, Puntarenas, the most visited National park in Costa Rica, has a new universal trail sponsored by the Costa Rica Electricity Institute (ICE). “El Manglar” (The Mangrove) is the name of the new elevated trail that has a length of 784 meters (2,572 feet) and is 2.4 meters wide (7.87 feet); it was built over a mangrove, hence the name, in an area of the ...

As consumers become increasingly concerned about the environmental impact of agro-commodity production, with the click of a button, companies buying pineapples from Costa Rica – one of the world's largest producers of the fruit – can now see if their suppliers are engaged in deforestation or not, with help from the United Nations' Green Commodities Programme. The Land Use Change Monitoring Syst...

The wonders of Corcovado National Park have been recognized by several travel magazines and environmental publications in the past, among them Discovery Corp. which considered it as one of the best National Parks in the world, and National Geographic which described it as “the most biologically intense area in the world when it comes to biodiversity”; today, the beauty of this park located in Cost...

This is the first time in history that a Costa Rican government complies with what is established in the Ley Orgánica del Ambiente of 1995 (Organic Law of the Environment) by presenting the State of the Environment Report, a document that provides a common frame of information to address environmental topics by sectors and in a comprehensive way, with the purpose of providing a diagnosis of the st...

A colony of bats from the species Furipterus horrens set a nest under the roof of one of the rooms at the Selva Verde Lodge in Chilamate de Sarapiquí, Heredia. This species of bat had not been seen in Costa Rica for more than 45 years and in fact there are not many left worldwide. One of the bungalow type rooms at this hotel was the place picked by  close to 80 bats who set their nest; the h...

Every year thousands of tourists visit the Marino Ballena National Park, located in the South Pacific of Costa Rica and famous for the common sightings, specially certain times during the year, of whales and dolphins; however, this natural wealth is being threatened by climate change. “Climate change is already here. It is not just a change of temperature, it goes way beyond that”, said to EF...

The Ministry of Environment and Energy in Costa Rica (MINAE) is carrying out the campaign “Limpia tu Huella” (Clean your Footprint), on Saturday, February 24 and are requesting the help of volunteers that wish to participate on the cleaning of National Wildlife Refuge Camaronal located in the North Pacific of Costa Rica, seven miles south of Playa Samara. The contamination of the oceans is af...

The lake that reappeared at the crater of the Poas Volcano in Costa Rica late January, is still somewhat superficial, but in its deepest point it reaches 15m (50 feet). Eliecer Duarte from the Observatory of Volcanic and Seismic Activity in Costa Rica (OVSICORI), explained to national daily La Nacion, that some of the formations that had been documented just a few weeks back have now disappe...

The Turrialba Volcano registered yet another important eruption, this Monday, February 12 at approximately 4:30 a.m. with a column that reached 1000 meters above the crater and 4,340 meters above sea level (14,235.2 ft.). The impressive was even visible from the Irazu Volcano as you can see in the video included below. The emission of ash is continuous and of variable volume and has been consta...

The University of Costa Rica is organizing the International Symposium based around Isla del Coco, an event that will bring together experts from different countries who have researched and studied this National Park which was declared a World Natural Heritage site twenty years ago. Isla del Coco has been an object of different investigations and studies for centuries. At the end of the XIX and...

Costa Rica is known among other things as a great producer of bananas, it has been for many years one of the main economic activities of this country and one of the most important export products. During 2017 Costa Rica was able to generate over U.S. $1 billion through the export of bananas, increasing from U.S. $800 million in 2016. This industry also sustains over 100 thousand families. ...

A new species of the plant Tachia was recently discovered at Isla del Coco, Costa Rica; the information was published in the Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas. Guillermo Blanco park ranger of the National Park was the first to discover the plant and immediately informed a group of botanic experts from the Costa Rica National Herbarium which belongs to the National Museum. Th...

Another giraffe joined the tower of giraffes at Ponderosa Adventure Park in Liberia, Guanacaste, Costa Rica. “Maira” was the name given to the new member of the Ponderosa family, and she was born January 23, she stood at 1.45 meters (4’7”) in height and is the daughter of Alika a firs time mother and the alpha male Mao. Maira is the 11th giraffe in the park, and there are two others that are...

A newly discovered wasp species that so far it has only been found in Costa Rica, has experts around the world shocked because the small insect cuts its host open from the inside. Dendrocerus scutellaris is the scientific name of this sesame seed size wasp that has the characteristic of having saw-like spikes which scientists suspect are used by the wasp to cut open the host and lay their eggs,...

The Costa Rican government has invested for the first time in necessary equipment and tools for the prevention and control of forest fires. The purchase of 15 “rapid intervention” Toyota Land Cruiser vehicles will allow firefighters to prevent and extinguish wildfires in the protected areas, these vehicles have the capacity to carry 125 gallons of water and are commonly used by rural fire servi...

The Tenorio Volcano in Guanacaste, Costa Rica is classified as an dormant or inactive volcano; however, the area presents six seismic faults which generate seismic activity. This year, however, the activity has been increasing, and since January 9 through date the area has been affected by an earthquake swarm that registered 505 events of different magnitude, the strongest ones registered we...

So far this year the Turrialba Volcano in Costa Rica had maintained a passive emission of ash with columns that generally don’t exceed the 500 meters above the active crater and the 3,840 meters above sea level (12,595.2 ft.), however, the morning of this Tuesday, February 6 the Volcano registered a significant eruption with a column that reached 1000 meters above the crater and 4,340 meters above...

Sirenas Diving Costa Rica, a small, diving, snorkeling and fishing tour company that operates in Guanacaste had the opportunity to capture an amazing experience in video this past January 22 about 800 meters from the coast of Playas del Coco. Bobbie Joe and her husband Jose Daniel Barrera from Sirenas Diving, were giving snorkeling lessons in the area when they had a close encounter with a baby...