Tag Archives: Pitfall traps

Forest Cano-pee & Meeting the Queen!

Day 2 in the rainforest started off early with a lot of sightings during the morning birdwatch. I saw two crimson-collared tanagers, which are black with a red head and rump, as well as a black mask. I also say a blue-gray tanager, which is a bit smaller and flies by sporadically flitting its wings. One bird that I had to research in my field guide to identify was a white-collared seedeater! This bird was small (like the size of a finch), had a black head, light-colored wingbar(s), brown/white patchy body, and a white band laterally around its throat. I spotted it in the grass, which makes sense if it was foraging for seeds. I also saw a pale-billed woodpecker, which is a very large woodpecker with a black body, bright red head, and a white line down both sides of its neck that meets on its back. One bird that I managed to get a photo of was a social flycatcher! It was brown with a yellow breast and belly. Its white head had a black eyeline and crown, and its wings had a light wingbar.

Then, we started another experiment testing the nutrient attraction of arthropods and their abundance on the forest ground versus the forest canopy. We chose methodology to place pitfall traps of both water and a nutrient solution to test our question. The nutrient solution that was the most widely available was our own urine, so we all peed in tubes. We ranked our pee in hydration by comparing color. A huge shoutout to Rusty for having crystal clear pee and being my TFB hydration idol. Then, we put our water and pee tubes on the floor and hung them on trees!

Right by my pitfall tree, we spotted a jumping pit viper! Luckily, Phoenix saw it before anyone got too close, so we were all safe.

We also saw an eyelash viper curled on a nearby log! Rafael, the LCRS station manager, said that he had never seen an eyelash viper in all his 12 years here, so we were super lucky to see one! I didn’t get a photo, but a lot of my classmates did.

We also did a leafcutter ant activity where we dug up their nests. We started with a 1-year-old nest, and we took turns digging with a shovel. We found the fungal gardens, and it looked like spongy, white honeycomb. After some more digging, Scott uncovered the queen! She was huge and was being protected by smaller ants, but she didn’t try to bite anyone. I got to hold her! I feel so lucky to have met the queen.

We moved onto another bigger nest, but there were too many rocks and roots to dig it up. Right when we were about to find another nest, Michael shoveled one last scoop and initiated another lucky find! Sitting in the mound was a Mexican burrowing toad! This toad is black with orange markings and very round in shape. Its head is very small and is basically missing a neck. When Rusty gave his amphibian taxon briefing last night, he said that he really wanted to find one of these toads. So another shoutout to Rusty for his toad-finding dreams coming true, I’m so happy for him!

I gave my topic lecture on neotropical plant-insect interactions, and I think it went really well!

After sunset, we went on a night hike! Before leaving, I spotted a red-rumped tarantula on the deck! It crawled out of a space between some of the wooden planks.

Then on the actual night hike, We had so many amazing sightings! We saw two Morelet’s tree frogs, as well as their eggs. It is extremely rare to spot Morelet’s tree frogs because they are critically endangered, so we were really lucky to see them! Then we spotted small snakes on the tree branches above us. We witnessed one snake eat tree frog eggs!

The theme of today seemed to be pure luck, and I feel so fortunate to have experienced it all. Maybe tomorrow Ava will catch a blue morpho butterfly!

– McKenna

Our First Completed Experiment

May 18, 2019

This morning we collected our pitfall traps, which we filled with either urine or water yesterday to answer some research questions. We wanted to know if there was greater arthropod diversity on the forest floor or in the canopy and if the forest floor or the canopy was more nitrogen-limited (urine is a great source of nitrogen in case you were wondering).

Once we got back to the research station, we did inventory on the beetles, ants, ticks, etc. that fell into our traps. The unknown species of large black beetle with the red outline around its thorax and abdomen was in several of our samples. This beetle seems to be a reoccurring theme in these posts, or perhaps he’s the beetle mascot of Las Cuevas. Either way, I’ll have to do some research to identify him once we have internet access.

During our hike to collect these traps, I came across my first net-winged beetle (from the genus Calopteron). The species I have on my taxon ID card is Calopteron discrepans. I think this beetle was a different species that I came across in my research, but I can’t remember the species name at the moment. Calopteron discrepans has multiple thick black bands on orange wings, while this species only had one faint black band.

18/05/19 Introducing Sunshine the Moth

I rolled out of bed for 5:00am birding + a cup of coffee. Disclaimer: I am not a coffee-drinker, but early mornings have made it a necessity. The low, breath-like calls of the howler monkey were eerie in the pre-dawn darkness.

After breakfast, we hiked along the Maya Trail to pick up the pit fall traps that had been set up yesterday and left out for 24 hours. Along the way, I caught a butterfly with my hands (swallowtail, same coloration as those at Caracol) granted it was dead.

Swallowtail Butterfly (dead)

Some cool things observed on the hike:

– flock of green parrots that made noises like stormtrooper bullets

-toucan

-THE endangered Morelet’s tree frog! It was adorable!

Morelet’s Tree Frog, endangered species!

I managed to catch a good number of bugs in my pit fall traps—1 beetle, 6 ants total. It’s strange to think that these animals drowned to death in my urine.

We ended the day with lectures on ants, amphibians, and visual and auditory communication in rainforest animals.

Later that night, I was in bed when I was called to the restroom. A moth had fallen onto Bella’s head while she was on the toilet. It was rather large with a wingspan of around 13cm and had the coloration of a speckled yellow leaf. I removed the moth from the restroom and let it crawl around my shoulder. Although moth coloration is limited in vibrancy in comparison to butterfly coloration, I still found the yellow moth incredibly stunning. I have named it Sunshine. Sunshine kept falling off my hand and onto the wooden floor. Moths are hilariously clumsy creatures, falling off surfaces and bumping into them constantly. This may be attributed to their thick bodies. I can empathize with them as a fellow less-than-graceful creature.

Imperial Moth, Eacles imperialis

Pitfall Trap Analysis + Night Hike

Happy Sunday everyone! Today’s schedule was a bit different than those of our other days here. The morning began with a short hike along the Maya trail to pick up the pitfall traps that we had set up yesterday and analyzing our data. Specifically, we examined species’ richness and abundance on the forest floor and compared those values to the canopy’s. We also investigated whether there would be greater species’ richness and abundance in the urine vials relative to the water vials in the canopy as opposed to the vials in the forest floor. Interestingly, we found that both richness and abundance were higher in the forest floor than in the canopy and that the abundance in urine was greater than in water in both locations.

A female pinching beetle (Lucanus capreolus) from one of our pitfall traps
A female pinching beetle (Lucanus capreolus) from one of our pitfall traps

Many beetle specimens were collected today (10 species and 18 specimens to be exact) from our pitfall traps! A few of the most interesting were a fairly large beetle of about 3.5 cm long with a shiny black body rimmed with red that I believe may be a female pinching beetle (Lucanus capreolus), a very small slightly shimmery dark brown or olive green color leaf beetle (perhaps either a Dogbane Beetle with scientific name Chrysochus auratus or a type of flea beetle), and a black darkling beetle with a segmented body (species possibly Alobates pennysylvanicus).

Some of the beetle specimens brought to me from our pitfall trap experiment!
Some of the beetle specimens brought to me from our pitfall trap experiment

As you can see, today was a fairly light day in terms of physical activity, but I am sure we will make up for it with the night hike tonight and especially with collecting all of the camera traps tomorrow. I am excited to see what animals are in the images we’ve captured (hopefully a picture of a jaguar?!?)! Thanks for reading! 🙂

A giant spider that we found along the path
A giant spider that we found along the path during our night hike

Update: We got to hear from a Ph.D. student named Lauren tonight! She’s currently a little more than halfway through an eight month study here and is using 52 pairs of camera traps to conduct research on carnivorous forest creatures. Also, the night hike along the Maya trail was super cool! We saw tarantulas and other spiders the size of our palms, a cockroach the size of a large mouse, and a coral snake among many other species!

And I must end this post with a picture of a cool beetle from the night hike :)
And I must end this post with a picture of a cool beetle from the night hike 🙂