Angélica leaves the house followed by three dogs that run to receive the new visitors. She opens the gate, greets kindly and invites them to come in. The family from Buenos Aires fills out a form with their personal information and the woman accompanies them to the start of the tour where a sign with a photo displays the three key points of La Buitrera.
«The mushroom area is dangerous and they cannot enter there. There are stones that are easily disarmed. All that is going down and there is a crack“he warns them.
A few meters away, a couple was returning from the tour with their pants covered in caltrops. «The chicks eat the caltrops. Stand in front of them and you don’t have to do much more,” she recommends smiling. The couple takes the advice.
Angélica “Quela” Crespo was born on the La Lucha ranch in Ñirihuau Arriba, 20 kilometers from Bariloche, in 1965. «I was born on that piece of wood, just like my father. My great-grandfather came from Carmen de Patagones and founded all this,” said the 58-year-old woman.
The ranch is nestled at the foot of La Buitrera hill, made up of sedimentary and volcanic rock formations, eroded by wind and water.
“We always live with all this. We would go up there and it was like a walk. There were days when relatives came to visit us and we took them there,” Quela said, adding: “It is a tuff stone that is easily disarmed and therefore, the holes. By wind and water erosion. Although the place is known as La Buitrera, condors perch in these natural holes and also attract visitors.
Angélica’s father used to attend to the people who came to the property asking for access to see the rock formation and see the condors. He always allowed entry. The man died in June of last year, days before his 93rd birthday.
During the pandemic, when outings were limited, many more people were interested in the place, the photos began to go viral on social networks and the place became a boom. The Crespo family decided to put a symbolic value at the entrancedue to the time it took to receive each group and explain the characteristics of the place.
- 1.000 pesos
- The entrance costs for Argentines and 1,500 pesos for foreigners.
Little by little, the walk became regular. Today admission to La Buitrera is from Thursday to Monday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The family estimates that between 70 and 130 people attend per day to the ranch La Lucha.
«I attend to people who are aware of what I have and they go down hallucinating. I have seen people come down with tears in their eyes. I never saw anything like it. The risk of the walk is not high; we can say that It is medium. In fact, we received an 83-year-old grandmother who was able to upload it, “she acknowledged.
He said that once, he was forced to signal lights with a flashlight to some boys who ended up going down at night because, according to what they trusted, they wanted to see the sunset. Before the message, the young people responded with the light of the cell phone.
Angélica warned that a biologist usually visits the place to study the behavior of the condors. «The birth of a pigeon followed. She studied the mother when she made the nest and evaluated how the female behaved with the egg. A couple lays an egg every two years, but then the two take care of it and feed it, “she confided.
Long before the place became a tourist hotspot, the Crespos raised animals and had a greenhouse. When the visitors began to invade that sector, those tasks became more complicated due to lack of time.
Rainfall
The road to the rock formations is a slight ascent in the middle of a steppe landscape surrounded by chacay, michay, thistles and coirón bushes. The appearance of the rocks impacts in the distance.
Andrés Folguera, a professor at the University of Buenos Aires and a Conicet researcher, acknowledged that there are two features that draw attention to the place: the rocks themselves and their appearance. «The rocks are made up of ashes that are easily removed by rainwater and take on curious shapes. But that aspect, the most distinctive, is the least interesting. It simply has to do with the slow wear caused by water and wind,” Folguera stated.
Geologist Juan Ignacio Falco, a researcher at the Institute for Research on Cultural Diversity and Change Processes, of the National University of Río Negro and Conicet, explained that this deposit called La Buitrera It is part of the Ñirihuau basin which developed around 20 to 10 million years ago.
“That basin was formed in the last period of construction of the Andes Mountains, as we know it today. Mountain ranges, like we have here, have existed throughout the geological history of northern Patagonia. During the last 400 million years there were mountain ranges that were built and eroded“, detailed this Conicet researcher.
He specified that this sector is made up of volcanic rocks called ignimbrites: «They are deposits of currents of pyroclastic density, originated from the explosion of a volcano. When an explosion occurs, fragments of pumice, glass shards, crystals, and debris from the duct are ejected into the air. When this column collapses, it falls and generates a deposit of ignimbrite. When you look at samples of these rocks under a microscope, you can even see bits of glass.”
What are the holes in the rocks where condors perch? Falco assured that they are pre-existing to wind or water erosion, although both might have exacerbated them.
The scenic beauty of this deposit is more modern and is a few thousand years old. It is the product of fluvial and wind erosion that shaped the area as we see it now.”
Sergio Lambertucci, doctor in Biology and principal investigator of the Conicet.
The mountain range that surrounds La Buitrera also draws attention for the variety of colors. “It is the color of the original volcanic rock. Many times, the color of the rocks is provided by alteration processes: water infiltrates the rocks and paints them. dyes them In the case of La Buitrera, the color is given by its volcanic origin and subsequent alteration processes,” Folguera pointed out.
Falco stressed that fossils of mammals, plant remains, fish, and marine invertebrates possibly linked to the Pacific Ocean were found in the area, since, as he explained, “when the North Patagonian Andes Mountain Range was not yet so high, it is believed that there was a connection with the ocean The lifting of the mountain range itself would have closed those connection zones.
The place chosen by condors
The doctor in Biology Sergio Lambertucci explained that, in a sector of La Buitrera, there are condor roosts and in another nearby area, nests. Every year some other pigeon is born in that area.
As indicated, they have been counted around 130 condors in La Buitrera on specific occasions.
“They do not nest in roosts, where they spend the night in groups. You can see one, 10 or 130 on a wall. The roosts rotate as they find food and depending on climatic variables”, explained this main researcher at Conicet and professor at the Bariloche Regional University Center (Crub), of the Comahue National University.
To sleep, they look for vertical cliff walls “difficult to access for humans and predatory mammals.” “On those ledges they stand. They also look for altitude to fly in good conditions. Perhaps the most important point is that they use places that are protected from the weather, and for this reason they vary depending on the day, but also the season,” he clarified.
In autumn, winter and spring it is the ideal time to observe dozens of condors in La Buitrera. Not so much in summer, unless there is a storm.
These birds can travel up to 400 kilometers daily at a variable speed. The average is regarding 40 kilometers per houralthough they can fly more than 120 kilometers for now.
“La Vuitrera is a sedimentary stone in which, due to erosion, many holes of different sizes are generated. The condors, standing up, measure a little more than a meter, and many of these caves have the same or lower altitude. Therefore, they must be very careful when landing. As they are flying experts, they come flying, they stop at the entrance of the cave and they crouch, many times, to enter. That is more complex for juveniles, and they can be seen making various attempts to perch,” she noted.
Lambertucci recounted that a condor lays an egg every two years. They usually use the same area, but not necessarily the same ledge. This chick leaves the nest at 6 months and begins to fly around the area, staying with its parents for several months, until the following reproductive season.
He considered that the surroundings of Bariloche and La Buitrera, in particular, “It is an excellent area for observing these majestic birds. There we can see them returning to rest, learning to fly, and playing in the air among many other behaviors.”
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