It’s already our second Saturday on this trip. We get back on Wednesday. Time is passing so fast. This morning for breakfast they changed it up with some ham and bread with the beans and eggs rather than bacon and tortillas. It wasn’t a coffee morning for me though.
After breakfast, Michael presented his lecture in tropical soils, during which we were all told to hydrate and drink our water. After the lecture, we did an experimental design for testing the abundance of arthropods on the forest floor vs the canopy, in nutrient rich conditions (pee tubes) vs nutrient poor conditions (water tubes). After planning, we then went to pee into tubes. The setup for this experiment is: at breast height on a tree, one water tube and one pee tube will be wired onto opposite sides of the tree, and then at the base of the tree, with the same orientation, the second water and pee tubes will be put flush into holes in the ground.
The tubes are going to be picked up tomorrow for collection and counting of arthropods. I didn’t actually go out with the group to put the tubes up since my ankle was hurting from twisting it yesterday, but my tubes were placed in the field by someone. While they were out, they apparently ran into a jumping viper (venomous) and an eyelash viper (also venoumous) that someone who has worked here for 12 years hadn’t even seen.
The group returned at lunch, which is when I rejoined them. After lunch, we went exploring around the field station clearing on the search for small leaf cutter ant nests. Once we decided on one, Scott instructed us on how to dig next to it to find the fungus cavity. This nest was young, only about a year old, so it was quite small. We saw some seargent majors (large worker ants), but no soldiers (large defense ants) since the colony was so short. He dug out some of the fungus from in the cavity, and eventually pulled out the queen for viewing. She was huge!
In an attempt to excavate a larger colony (which ended up being abandoned), we found a Mexican burrowing toad!! They are super funny looking guys, with gelatinous bodies, splayed legs and almost no neck. I didn’t get to hold him since I was wearing bug spray, but he was such a rare and cool find.
Scott then excavated another colony, solely to show us what soldiers looked like. Some people picked them up, and even let them bite their shirts?? It’s a no from me dawg.
I didn’t have much exposure to new trees today, but while we were in the clearing looking at the ant nests, we noticed some almost blackberry looking things on the ground, which I identified as some sort of cone, that were very light and had a woody consistency when cut into. These cones are the seeds of the bay cedar (Guazuma ulmifolia). I also believe I saw a small Billy Webb tree (Acosmium panamensis) along the edge of the clearing based on the shape and color of its fruits, although I could be wrong.
We finished up the day with the lectures of the day before dinner, with free time or an optional night hike (which I did not choose to go on, again, because of my ankle).
today is also the day that I learned that I am covered in chigger bites on my arms from yesterday’s falls. They’re so itchy, I hate it.
That concludes day 11 – can’t believe we’re so far in.