Cuenca Los Ojos

What Cuenca Los Ojos does

Cuenca Los Ojos is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit conservation organization, headquartered in Tucson, Arizona, that protects and restores more than 121,000 acres of land across the US-Mexico borderlands. Founded around 1990 and active in land acquisition since the mid-1990s, the organization began as a watershed-restoration initiative and has since evolved into a landscape-scale rewilding program operating in both the southwestern United States and northern Mexico.

Its core activities are land acquisition and stewardship, watershed and riparian restoration, and keystone-species reintroduction. The flagship program is a plains bison (Bison bison bison) reintroduction built around an existing ~500-animal herd maintained at Janos, Chihuahua, Mexico since 2009, with 29 additional animals released in Sonora in February 2026. A broader reintroduction pipeline — beaver, prairie dogs, pronghorn antelope, and elk — is being assembled around the bison herd to rebuild a functional grassland and riparian ecosystem. The work is binational in scope, integrating US-held protected lands with restoration sites in Mexico.

Cuenca Los Ojos is funded almost entirely through philanthropic donations and grants; it has no commercial products, services, or pricing model. The organization operates with a small staff of approximately 25 people across both countries, and its economic engine is long-horizon land conservation monetized through donor support for ecosystem recovery rather than through market revenue.

Name

Cuenca Los Ojos

Legal name

Cuenca Los Ojos

Website

https://cuencalosojos.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

1990

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Cuenca Los Ojos is a nonprofit conservation organization that protects and rewilds more than 121,000 acres of US-Mexico borderland habitat. It reintroduces keystone species such as plains bison and operates binational restoration programs funded by philanthropic donations.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Ecological Restoration Services

NAICS

Support Activities for Forestry (115310), Support Activities for Forestry (1153), Forest Nurseries and Gathering of Forest Products (113210)

SIC

Forestry (800)

akta.pro primary industry

Ecosystem Restoration & Rewilding Services (AFAMAMAE)

Keywords

• Ecological restoration services
• Wildlife conservation programs
• Watershed restoration projects
• Bison reintroduction programs
• Land rewilding initiatives

Headquarters

HQ city

Tucson

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices3 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Supply Chain, Marketing or Sales, Others

Revenue model

1. Donations and Charitable Contributions: The organization operates as a nonprofit relying on public donations and charitable contributions from individuals, foundations, and organizations committed to conservation and rewilding efforts in the borderlands region

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels10 records

Core offering

Cuenca Los Ojos is a nonprofit conservation organization that protects, restores, and rewilds biodiversity across 121,000+ acres in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Its core work consists of hydrologic and watershed restoration, keystone species reintroduction (bison, beaver), regenerative ranching, predator recovery, and progressive fire management. Programs are delivered by an in-house team of restoration technicians and coordinators operating from field sites in Arizona and Sonora, Mexico.

Product overview

Cuenca Los Ojos is a nonprofit conservation organization offering a portfolio of ecological restoration and rewilding services rather than a traditional tech product. Its core offerings include watershed restoration, bison reintroduction (as a keystone species), beaver reintroduction, regenerative ranching, and predator recovery programs. Planned expansion includes prairie dog restoration, antelope and elk reintroduction, and enhanced fire management. The organization works at landscape scale across 121,000+ acres in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, focusing on reinstating ecological and evolutionary processes that allow nature to function in its full wildness.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Rewilding Programs Landscape-scale ecological restoration program that reinstates missing ecological processes by reintroducing native species, restoring waterways, and jump-starting self-willed natural development across the U.S.-Mexico borderlands.
• Bison Reintroduction Keystone species reintroduction program that restores grassland structure, soil compaction, nutrient distribution, and plant diversity by reintroducing bison absent from the region for over 200 years.
• Watershed and Waterway Restoration Restoration of rivers, streams, and dry washes that creates contiguous habitat corridors connecting mountains and valleys, wetlands, and grasslands across the Sky Island Region.
• Beaver Reintroduction Restoration of beaver populations to modify the landscape through dam construction, increasing riparian corridor patchiness and creating micro-habitats for fish and aquatic species.
• Regenerative Ranching Large herbivore management program where cattle serve as a substitute for historically absent bison, supporting ecological balance while maintaining productive land use.
• Predator Recovery Habitat restoration providing refuge for large carnivores including black bear, jaguar, and ocelot, reviving the ecological process of predation and trophic balance.

Quantifiable outcome

• ~500 bison specimens achieved at Janos reserve since 2009 reintroduction of 23
• +2 more outcomes

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature5 records

Scale indicators5 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Broad incumbents

• World Wildlife Fund: Global conservation organization with active programs in landscape restoration, species recovery, and binational cooperation. Comparable as a global funding/partner incumbent that could act as an enabling funder or collaborator for landscape-scale rewilding efforts.
• The Nature Conservancy: One of the largest global conservation nonprofits, operating across habitat protection, restoration, and species conservation in the Americas including the Sky Island region. Comparable as a large-scale land conservation and restoration operator, though it spans many regions and program types rather than specializing in rewilding.
• Defenders of Wildlife: National wildlife conservation nonprofit with strong programs in imperiled species recovery, including wolves, bison, and borderlands wildlife. Comparable mission overlap on keystone species and policy advocacy, though operates as a policy/incumbent national NGO rather than a hands-on rewilding land manager.

Regional players

• Sky Island Alliance: Regional conservation nonprofit dedicated specifically to the Sky Island region of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Directly comparable geography and binational scope, though more focused on corridor protection, wildlife monitoring, and water than on keystone species reintroduction.
• Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative: Nonprofit focused on connecting and restoring habitats from Yellowstone to Yukon through wildlife corridors and landscape conservation. Comparable in pursuing connectivity, keystone species recovery, and continental-scale ecological restoration, though focused on a different North American geography.
• Malpai Borderlands Group: Landowner-led collaborative conservation group in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands of Arizona/New Mexico/Sonora. Operates in the same Sky Island borderlands region with similar binational focus and large-landscape stewardship ethos, though oriented around working rangelands rather than rewilding per se.

Direct peers

• Rewilding Europe: European nonprofit implementing rewilding initiatives across multiple landscape-scale areas, with a strong focus on keystone species reintroduction (including European bison) and natural processes. Closest international peer in mission, methodology, and operating model.
• Rewilding Argentina: Argentina-based foundation leading rewilding of the Iberá wetlands, with major macaw and jaguar reintroduction programs. Directly comparable as a landscape-scale rewilding nonprofit in Latin America restoring extirpated keystone species, with overlapping donor and media audiences.
• American Prairie Foundation: Nonprofit building the largest nature reserve in the contiguous U.S. in Montana, with a central focus on free-roaming bison reintroduction and landscape-scale rewilding. Directly comparable model: land assembly, keystone species reintroduction, science-led rewilding at scale.
• The Rewilding Institute: Rewilding advocacy and project organization founded by Dave Foreman, focused on continental-scale rewilding, apex predator recovery, and ecological connectivity across North America. Highly comparable philosophy and target outcomes (keystone species, trophic recovery), though it is more advocacy-oriented than land-managing.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat3 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/@CuencaLosOjos
• Facebookfacebook.com/CuencaLosOjos
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/cuenca-los-ojos
• Instagraminstagram.com/cuencalosojos
• TikToktiktok.com/@cuencalosojos

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles8 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Cuenca Los Ojos