The Baritú National Park is a national park

National park

A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individual nations designate their own national parks differently A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or...

 of Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, located in the Santa Victoria Department, in the north of the province

Provinces of Argentina

Argentina is subdivided into twenty-three provinces and one autonomous city...

 of Salta

Salta Province

Salta is a province of Argentina, located in the northwest of the country. Neighboring provinces are from the east clockwise Formosa, Chaco, Santiago del Estero, Tucumán and Catamarca. It also surrounds Jujuy...

, in the Argentine Northwest

Argentine Northwest

The Argentine Northwest is a region of Argentina composed by the provinces of Catamarca, Jujuy, Salta, Santiago del Estero and Tucumán.-Geography:The region had 5 different biomes:* Sub-Andean humid Sierras of the east...

. The park borders Bolivia (Tarija province), and is more easily accessed through that country. It has an area of 720 square kilometres and it is the only tropical park in Argentina.

The park was created in 1974. It is bordered by mountains. The protected area belongs to the Southern Andean Yungas

Southern Andean Yungas

The Southern Andean Yungas is a tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forest ecoregion in the Yungas of southwestern Bolivia and northwestern Argentina.-Climate:This ecoregion has a subtropical highland climate...

 ecoregion

Ecoregion

An ecoregion , sometimes called a bioregion, is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than an ecozone and larger than an ecosystem. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and contain characteristic, geographically distinct assemblages of natural...

, which is composed of Sub-Andean hills measuring 300 to 400 m in height. The climate is wet and hot, with summer rainfall that goes from 900 to 1300 mm.

The fauna of the park includes several endangered species

Endangered species

An endangered species is a population of organisms which is at risk of becoming extinct because it is either few in numbers, or threatened by changing environmental or predation parameters...

, such as the yaguareté

Jaguar

The jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...

 and the onza

Onza

The Onza is a species of wild cat considered to be a legend and one of the numerous creatures studied by cryptozoology. The term onza can also refer to the jaguarundi . It is known as a type of cryptid....

.

The cedro salteño trees ("Salta cedrela

Cedrela

Cedrela is a genus of seven species in the mahogany family Meliaceae. They are evergreen or dry-season deciduous trees with pinnate leaves, native to the tropical and subtropical New World, from southern Mexico south to northern Argentina. The name is derived from a diminutive form of Cedrus...

s") reach huge sizes in this region. Their wood is considered extremely valuable.

Sources

• Administración de Parques Nacionales - National Parks Administration of Argentina (in Spanish and English)
• National Parks of the Yungas