I've been a hiker for a while. Around the 90's I made a foray into rock climbing and mountaineering thanks to Oikos, the outdoors club from the Universidad Simón Bolívar (USB). The walks with the club allowed me to get to know several National Parks in Venezuela and Colombia. That's how my love and interest for nature started. To some extent this took me to study biology at the USB in 1994. In 1995 my interest for the ecological problems caused by habitat fragmentation was born when I started working in the wooded islands of the Guri Dam (Bolivar State, Venezuela). There I did my thesis project and have been working ever since. My interest for the National Parks and their problems took me, along with Dr. Viviana Salas, to found Bioparques in 2002. However, in 2001 I was already coordinating the fieldwork for the National Park Monitoring Program (Parkswatch Venezuela). Until August 2004 I worked as Program Coordinator in Bioparques.

Since September 2004 I have returned to school as regular student in the Masters Program for Environment and Development at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom. My academic interests include the interaction of social and ecological systems. I am particularly concerned in re-focusing Venezuela National Parks as tools for conservation and development, especially at the rural level. I am interested in approaching the conflicts generated by their creation by using multidisciplinary research with a social sciences perspective. Also, as an amateur photographer, music enthusiast and an assiduous traveler, I have found it joyful and rewarding to try to live my life to the height of my dreams.

Relevant Publications

Aponte, C., Barreto, G. and Terborgh, J. (2003). Habitat Fragmentation Effects on Age Structure and Life-History of a Tortoise Population. Biotropica, 35(4), 550-555.

Aponte, C. (2001). Life history changes in a Geochelone carbonaria population as a consequence of habitat fragmentation. IV World Congress of Herpetology. Bentota, Sri Lanka.

Additional Aponte publications are available online at www.parkswatch.org and www.bioparques.org.