Yanachaga–Chemillén National Park (Spanish: Parque Nacional Yanachaga-Chemillén) is a protected area in the Pasco region of Peru. It helps protect parts of the rainforests and cloud forests in central Peru.
The park serves as a safe place for wildlife that lived during the Pleistocene, a time when Earth’s climate changed greatly. This is shown by the wide variety of plant and animal life found there.
El Parque Nacional Yanachaga Chemillén (PNYCH) covers the Yanachaga mountain range. The main landscape includes forested mountains crossed by deep canyons. The area is very rough, with rocky hills covered in forests on both sides of the Palcazu River. The park’s elevation ranges from 460 to 3,643 meters above sea level.
This mix of land features and different climates creates many types of ecosystems in a small area, leading to a wide variety of plant and animal life.
In terms of cultural diversity, people living near the park can be grouped into three main communities: the indigenous Yanesha people, settlers from Europe (especially those of German descent), and immigrants from the Andes mountains in the central highlands of Peru. The Yanesha people live on the eastern side of the Yanachaga mountain range, near the Palcazu River basin. The other two groups mainly live on the western side of the same mountain range, in the Oxapampa-Pozuzo valley.
Objective
The park's purpose is to protect the upper areas of the basins where the tributaries of the Palcazu, Huancabamba, and Pozuzo rivers flow. It also aims to preserve natural areas that have been used for many years by the Yanesha or Amuesha indigenous communities who live in the region.
Ecology
The variety of animals in PNYCH is influenced by its mix of Andean-Patagonian, puna, and Amazonian environments, which include lowland and highland rainforests. The area is home to many native animals, especially small and medium-sized species. The park has a large number of bird species, with 527 different types recorded.
The land covered by PNYCH is called a "Pleistocene refuge," which is similar to a Glacial refugium. This means the area has forests that remained unchanged due to its isolation. During a time in Earth's history lasting hundreds of thousands of years, most of the Amazon rainforest was covered by grasslands because of major climate changes. The Pleistocene refuge idea explains why some Amazon forests have very high biodiversity, as these refuges helped many species survive and grow.
Forests cover most of PNYCH, except for high mountain grasslands. Plants found in the area include: Retrophyllum rospigliosii, Oenocarpus bataua, Podocarpus oleifolius, Euterpe precatoria, Cedrela odorata, Juglans neotropica, Clarisia racemosa, Phytelephas macrocarpa, Weinmannia spp., Calycophyllum spruceanum, Gynerium sagittatum, and others.
Mammals in the park include: capybara, jaguar, puma, white-tailed deer, spectacled bear, jaguarundi, ocelot, lowland paca, Northern pudu, and common woolly monkey, among others.
Birds are the group with the most recorded species in the park, totaling 527. Notable birds include the toucan (Ramphastos ambiguus), the cock-of-the-rock or tunqui (Rupicola peruviana), and mountain guans.
Representative reptiles in the area include the Cuvier's dwarf caiman and the spectacled caiman. Amphibians such as the frog Ctenophryne barbatula are found only in the Yanachaga–Chemillén National Park.