Public reading

Shaded-relief view of the land around Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste, the parcel boundary drawn in gold338 ha inside the gold line
2 km
Shaded relief · AWS Terrain Tiles

Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste

338 ha · 10.245, -85.842 · Costa Rica

66out of 100 · Land ScoreRestore

The capacity is present; the work is regeneration.

65th percentile for like land · Frontier tier · 43 conservation priority

Water
100
Soil
not read
Ecology
56
Climate
35
Pressure
86

8 of 13 sources answered · higher is better on every pillar; pressure reads calm · silent: sentinel2_ndvi, sentinel1_rtc, soilgrids…

The reading in full

This 338-hectare parcel near Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste is land with sound foundations and clear regenerative upside. It scores 66 out of 100 on the Dear Wise Earth Land Score.

The risks that most shape a decision here: Dry spells are projected to run about 66 days by 2050. A long rain-free stretch — not the yearly total — is what empties soil moisture and storage; size water storage and choose drought-tolerant planting to the dry spell, not the annual average. This area is highly exposed to projected climate change by 2050. Large shifts in temperature and rainfall can change what the land can support, so any plan should be built around the projected conditions, not current ones.

Where the upside lies: A watercourse runs through the parcel. On-site water supports irrigation, livestock, and habitat and can lower water-supply costs — though it may carry buffer or setback rules worth checking.

The wider readings: The land is projected to see roughly 124 hot days a year by 2050. Many days above 32 °C stress crops, livestock, workers, and unshaded ground; favour heat-tolerant species, shade, and water retention, and plan for cooling and storage. Rainfall is high and supports rain-fed use. There is enough water for most crops and forestry with little or no irrigation; dry-season storage still helps. The land is flat. Flat ground is easy to build on, farm, and mechanize, though low flat land can drain poorly and should be checked for waterlogging. The area has a rich record of documented wildlife. High biodiversity adds conservation value, may bring species-protection rules, and can support eco-tourism or habitat-credit programs. No satellite soil data is available for this parcel. Soil quality cannot be assessed remotely here, so a ground survey is needed before any agricultural or restoration decision. The parcel is relatively remote. Distance from roads and towns means lower encroachment pressure and more privacy, but higher transport and operating costs.

What the land is telling us: Read across the record, the land reads as stable: the canopy history shows no meaningful loss in a generation and the water signal is holding, which means the work is to build on a sound base rather than to reverse a decline. Of the land's core processes, the water cycle reads as adequate to abundant, so the question is less supply than how well the land captures and holds what falls and community dynamics look rich, with a deep record of documented life nearby. What orbit cannot see is what happens below the surface — soil biology, structure, and the carbon held in the ground — so treat those as the first things to confirm underfoot. Taken together, this is land with sound foundations and clear regenerative upside. Its clearest strength to build from is that a watercourse runs through the parcel.

The ground and its cover

Terrain · shaded relief — Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste
2 km
Terrain · shaded relief · AWS Terrain Tiles
Land cover · ESA WorldCover 2021 — Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste
2 km
Land cover · ESA WorldCover 2021 · ESA / Copernicus

The verdict, the five pillar readings, how much of the land was read, and the headline figures.

The verdict

66out of 100 · Land ScoreRestore

The capacity is present; the work is regeneration.

Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste

65th percentile for like land · Frontier tier · 43 conservation priority

Four of five readings

Water100strong
Soilnot read
Ecology56fair
Climate35watch
Pressure86strong

Weakest: ClimateNot read: Soil

All five read on one axis: higher is better. Pressure scores calm, so a high number means little human pressure on this land. The unread pillars had their weight redistributed across the rest — reweighted, never guessed.

Standing

65thpercentile

Tropical humid · Neotropic · against 26 readings · 67th of all 100

Coverage

8 of 13 layers answered

Nearly complete — gaps reweighted, not guessed.

Silent: Sentinel-2, the radar, the soil survey +2.

Where the capital goes

43/ 100 priority

Frontierhospitality fit 65

Best-fit model

Coastal buffer · blue–green

66 / 100

Fit from published rules over the indicators.

The land in numbers

Area
338ha
Elevation
12m
6–25 m
Slope
0.5°
Buildable bench
not read
Forest cover
58%
Canopy height
not read
Rainfall
2,281mm/yr
+43% over 20 yr
Warming to 2050
+1.1°C
rain -20%
Soil carbon
not read
Nearest road
5.4km
Species records
7,809records
GBIF, the global species archive

Headline figures. The Why tab carries each reading in full, with its source and its date. “Not read” means the source had nothing for this parcel: a gap is named, never filled with a guess.

How this land works

About 2,281 mm of rain falls here in a year. 58% of the parcel is under tree cover, and the ground is nearly flat (0.5° on average), so water lingers rather than runs. 27 mapped watercourses cross the land (Río Icacal, Quebrada Biscoyol). The nearest road is 5.4 km off, which is the pressure the edge lives with. By 2050 the models expect +1.1 °C and -20% rain, so every flow above runs a little differently than it does today.

Regeneratingalmost no tree cover lost since 2000; rainfall up 43% over twenty years.

To help: keep the canopy whole; the loop is running the right way on its own.

The score is the footnote. What matters is the pattern above it: what arrives, what the ground does with it, what leaves, and which way that is moving.

This place

338 hectares at Tamarindo of gentle land around 12 m. The ground reads 58% under canopy, 4% built. Water shapes it — 2,281 mm of rain a year, 27 traced watercourses.

Its vocationbuffer

Protect the blue–green edge. Low-lying at 12 m, this reads as a coastal or wetland edge — an inference from elevation and water signals, not a measured shoreline distance, so confirm how near the water actually is. If it holds, the play is the buffer: protect and restore it for blue carbon (the carbon coastal wetlands lock away), storm defence, and nursery habitat.

12 m elevation58% forest0.5° slope2,281 mm rain/yrFrontier tier — outside the mapped network
Its trajectoryholdingthe canopy record shows no meaningful loss in a generation.

This is an outsider's reading, assembled from instruments and public records. It is where understanding begins, not where it ends — the land, its neighbours, and the people who know it hold the rest.

Sources & method · 8 layers
Water, roads & protected areas — OpenStreetMap

Overpass (waterways, highways, places, protected areas)

vector · live
ODbL 1.0
Biodiversity — GBIF

Occurrence records (count + top species)

point · live
Mixed CC0 / CC-BY / CC-BY-NC (per dataset)
Place — OpenStreetMap / Nominatim

Nominatim reverse geocode

settlement · live
ODbL 1.0
Terrain — AWS Terrarium (Mapzen)

Terrarium elevation tiles

~10 m (z12) · 2017
Open (attribution)
Climate — Open-Meteo

Archive 2004–2024 + MPI-ESM1-2-XR to 2050

~9 km · 2004–2024 / 2045–2049
CC-BY 4.0 (data); non-commercial API tier
Land cover — ESA WorldCover

WorldCover 2021 v200

10 m · 2021
CC-BY 4.0 (commercial promotion: notify due@esa.int)
Surface water — JRC Global Surface Water

Global Surface Water v1.4 — occurrence & seasonality

30 m · 1984–2021
Copernicus / open (attribution)
Forest loss — Hansen Global Forest Change

Global Forest Change (tree cover 2000 + annual loss)

~30 m · 2000–2023
CC-BY 4.0

Every number above is public, open data — named, dated, and licensed. What TERRA does not publish is the lens: the weights, curves, and verdict thresholds that turn these layers into a Land Score. That judgment is calibrated from land walked on the ground, and it stays proprietary.

Unavailable for this parcel: Sentinel-2, the radar, the soil survey, the governance record, the thermal read — the affected pillars were reweighted, not guessed.

Generated Thu, 02 Jul 2026 03:50:13 GMT · 6.0s · synthesized by TERRA.