Henri Pittier National Park

Henri Pittier National Park, also called Rancho Grande National Park, park in the Cordillera de la Costa, Aragua estado (state), Venezuela, occupying an area of 350 sq mi (900 sq km) between Lago (lake) de Valencia and the Caribbean. It is Venezuela’s oldest national park. It was established in 1937, largely through the efforts of Henri Pittier, a Swiss geographer and botanist who studied and classified more than 30,000 plants in Venezuela. Pittier convinced the Venezuelan government that, without conservation efforts, the destruction of mountain forests would be inevitable and would create droughts in the Aragua Valley and hasten the drying up of Lago de Valencia, Venezuela’s largest natural inland lake.

Much of the park is covered with primeval rain forest, and it is home to more than 500 different species of birds. In addition, hundreds of thousands of birds and insects following a natural migratory route fly over the park at Portachuelo Pass. Originally established as Rancho Grande National Park, it was renamed for Pittier in 1953.