Our Region

The Ciénaga de Zapata Conservation Company, an entity whose functions are closely linked to the protection and sustainable use of forest resources in this southern Matanzas territory, has a patrimony of 491 325 hectares, of which 363,489 hectares ( 74%) hold the categories of protective and conservation forest. It extends throughout the south of the province of Matanzas, delimited to the north by the National Highway. It covers areas of the municipalities of Unión de Reyes, Jagüey Grande and Calimete and the entire territory of the Ciénaga de Zapata municipality, where its Central Office is located.

Its antecedents go back to the revolutionary triumph, which marked the beginning of a vast plan of afforestation of this area where until that date only exploitation actions were carried out. Since then it has been present with various denominations in the management of forest and wildlife resources in the area.

Forests on the central karst axis.

The forests of the Cienaga de Zapata extend like a belt throughout the center of the peninsula and east of the Bay of Pigs to the vicinity of the Bay of Jagua.

In some areas, this forest massif grows on a relatively higher strip of karst towards the center and lower towards the edges. These slight differences in height determine that some areas are frequently flooded and that others do not directly receive the effect of floods.

In the areas near the swamp grasslands, there is a strip of swamp forest, made up of species that can live on flooded soils much of the time, including Júcaro de Ciénaga (Bucida palustris), Júcaro Negro (Bucida buseras), White Oak (Tabebuia angustata), Majagua (Taliparites elatus), Ocuje (Calophyllum antillanum), Guano Cana (Maritime Sabal), Palma Real (Roystonea regia), Bagá (Annona glabra), Icaco (Chrysobalanus icaco) and Arraigan (Myrica cerifera) . These species, in turn, serve as a substrate for others that take advantage of the humidity of the environment such as Curujeyes (Tillandsia fasciculata), (T. balbisiana), (T. flexuosa), Guajaca (T. usneoides), Angelitos (Tolumnia variegata) and Orchids of various genera, Encyclia, Prostechaea, among others.

Swamps of the Ciénaga de Zapata

In the marshes, processes of accumulation of plant residues and peat formation occur due to different processes associated, among other aspects, with systematic flooding. The vegetation is mainly made up of grasslands made up of isolated seedlings of Cortadera de dos Filos (Cladium jamaicense) that reach up to 2 meters in height, and Yana (Conocarpus erectus), isolated, that can reach 3 meters in height, as well as Macío (Typha domingensis), Junco de Ciénaga (Eleocharis interstincta), Guano Prieto (Acoelorraphe wrightii), Junco Fino (Eleocharis cellulose), Arraigan (Myrica cerifera) Guano Cana (Sabal maritime) and Yanilla Blanca (Ilex cassine). There are also patches of swamp thickets, palm groves, savanna zones, intermittent lagoons and the mangrove variants that are more common at the edges of the water bodies.