As of November 2026, the black caiman is the largest kind of caiman, a reptile in the alligator family that lives in the slow rivers, lakes and flooded land of the Amazon, and historically it was heavily exploited because people hunted black caimans for their skins, which make shiny black leather. Some areas were hit harder by hunting than others, with hunting pressure continuing into the 1970s and beyond, and the population reduction is estimated at approximately 99 percent during the 20th century, which is an estimate and not an exact count. Scientists knew little about black caimans until the 1980s, and few good studies of their habits have been made.

As of November 2026, large-scale commercial exploitation of the black caiman is banned, though the species is still used for meat, eggs and skins. As of March 2013, some countries, such as Brazil, had given the black caiman legal protection, and French Guiana has fully protected it by law since 1986, as a 2019 study notes. In 1990, Bolivia began a program to breed black caimans in captivity and set them free in the wild, and a 2026 study of the reptile skin trade lists 3,320 black caiman skins traded from 2000 to 2020, saying that the species makes up under 1 percent of the market.

As of November 2026, records say that most populations appear to be recovering well. The Kaw Marsh black caiman population in French Guiana is not connected to the Brazilian population. Large predators like the black caiman can shape the community of animals around them, and where black caimans became rare, piranhas and capybaras became more common, and fish production in rivers fell. A capybara is a big rodent of South America, and a grown black caiman is among the biggest predators in its part of the Amazon, eating fish such as piranhas and catfish.

Without reliable census information, population surveys are the first step for any management program. In a 2022 survey by a Colombian Amazon community, reported in 2023, the largest caiman reached 5.7 metres and the smallest was 23 centimetres. In Mamirauá Reserve in Brazil, scientists counted caimans by boat at night from 2008 to 2023, and in Amazonas state a local community runs the only caiman management program authorised there. In the 2023 drought, 240 caimans were counted per kilometre, against a 2008 to 2022 average of 44, but the authors say their methods cannot show that the caiman population grew.

Clearing forest and burning swamps destroys black caiman homes and slows the recovery of their numbers, and as of November 2026, one source says some populations are declining because dams force caimans closer to people, while others suffer from mercury linked to small-scale gold mining. In the meantime a black caiman hunts mostly in the water, often at night, and a mother builds a mound nest in the dry season and stays close to it, while baby black caimans stay together in groups in the slow rivers, lakes and flooded land of the Amazon.

Words to know

• exploitation: heavy use
• captivity: human care
• census: count of animals
• predators: animal hunters
• mercury: toxic metal