Tag Archives: 2016

2016

Mouse-sized cockroaches and bird-sized spiders ahead

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We spent the whole day in the classroom today in order to finish up our project and some presentations and still be able to go on a night hike.

We wrapped up our nitrogen attraction experiment by counting all the arthropods and others in our urine and the water and finding the proportion. I had so many arthropods in my ground urine, but not in my tree urine. I found a very interesting spider related to a daddy long legs which had interesting markings on its back. It was about 1cm in body length. I nicknamed it the Leg Warmer Spider.

Leg Warmer Spider
Leg Warmer Spider

During the night hike it was a fabulous time for arachnids. We saw hundreds of wolf spiders and thousands of little spiders in the leaf litter which were too fast to get a look at. We saw one huge tarantula which was about 12 ft. up on a strangler fig. It was cinnamon-y in color, and probably a female of one of the species that have been described around here.

We also saw a huge black spider that was about 4-5cm in body length on the ground in some leaf litter off the trail. Its legs were bent so it was standing very tall off the ground. We looked for scorpions under almost every log along the train and did not find any. I wanted to see one under the black light cause they glow!

I think we also saw the leg warmer spider that I had named in class earlier. Its markings on its back were very similar and it was the same size. The markings themselves glowed in the black light.

Other than the arachnids, we saw some huge cockroaches and one of them excreted glue when we picked it up and it hissed. Sam didn’t even drop it. Also we found this huge cockroach that was as big as my hand and Adrienne overcame her fear and touched it.

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Day 6: In the Dark

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This morning we collected our pitfall traps and sorted through all of the samples. In the 16 hours the samples were out, a collective 256 arthropods of over 50 species were caught in our traps. We found ants, beetles, orthopteran, spiders, flies, roaches, and more. Our results showed that there is a greater species abundance and richness on the forest floor than in the canopy. Additionally, in comparing the abundance of arthropods caught in the urine traps versus the abundance of arthropods found in the water traps we found results that suggest a difference in nitrogen needs between the canopy and the floor. The results suggest there is a greater need for nitrogen in the canopy.

By dinner time, I still hadn’t spotted any new Lepidoptera aside from a fuzzy caterpillar that had been close to my pitfall traps. So, once it got dark out I started checking around the building lights for moths. I saw some very interesting looking moths:

  • A 4-5 cm orange moth with feathery antenna
  • A 2-3 cm brown moth with very cryptic coloring- very pretty [pic below]
  • A 2 ish cm orange moth with stripes
  • A 3-4 cm brown moth with pale blue splotches
  • A 2-3 cm moth that looks like a crumpled leaf
  • A 1 cm brown moth with bright yellow markings
  • A 1-2 cm black moth
  • A 2-3 cm brown moth that was folded up like a little roll
  • A 3-4 cm orange/tan moth that had FUZZY LEGS
  • A 3-4 cm white moth with black veining
  • A 3-4 cm fuzzy white moth
  • A 2-3 cm pale green mothDSCN0100

I saw all of these within minutes just by looking by light sources in the dark. Next we went on a night hike. I hadn’t expected to see any Lepidoptera but I actually saw a very large green caterpillar and a white furry(branch-like fuzz) caterpillar. We also saw a huge spider, tarantula, stick bugs larger than my hand, and a hissing cockroach to note a few things. And saw our first venemous snake- a coral snake! It was cool to see the critters of the forest that are usually hiding.

2016

Day 6: My first termite sighting!

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This morning, we went on another hike in search of howler monkeys.  We didn’t see any howlers, but instead we happened across a group of spider monkeys and coatis!  The coatis were much higher in the trees than I was expecting them to be, and they were jumping from tree to tree and crashing through the canopy.  Also, I saw my first termite today!  Stephanie brought me a box full from a hike yesterday.  They had black, spherical heads and appeared to be Constrictotermes cavifrons.

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After breakfast, we finished up our project from yesterday and presented our results.  We spent the rest of the day listening to presentations and taxon briefings.  After dinner, we talked with a woman in grad school who has spent the year doing research at Las Cuevas.  She had some incredible stories and I would love to be in her shoes someday.

Next, we went on a night hike.  We found some termites (possibly Heterotermes tenius) in a decomposing log.  We also saw a spider several inches tall, and a stick bug the length of my forearm.  On our way back, we saw a coral snake! Tomorrow, we will head back out on the 13-mile trek to collect our camera traps.  This place is already starting to feel like home, and I’m disappointed we’re leaving so soon.

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Day 5: My first and fiftieth mammal

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Today I saw a mammal!  Lucrecia and I went on a hike this morning, hoping to get closer to the howler monkeys we had been hearing.  Although they stopped howling as soon as we entered the forest, we saw several birds, including a flock of parrots and possibly a mot-mot.  I also found a log that appeared to have termite damage, but there were no termites to be found.  As we neared the clearing of the research station, we stopped to listen to a bird.  A few seconds later, a tayra wandered onto the path.  It didn’t seem scared to se us, and it walked towards us for several meters before wandering back into the forest.

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After breakfast, we finished up our Cecropia studies from yesterday.  After 24 hours, the masses of the juvenile leaves were still identical to those of the adult trees. 2 adult leaves and no juvenile leaves had visible damage from the herbivores, but this could be due to random chance or a physical difference in the leaves, so we can’t conclude that a chemical deterrent is preventing hervbivory in juvenile trees.  Also, we’re trying to have a conversation right now, but we can’t because the birds are too loud.  It’s awesome.

Belize limestone forms many caves, and we visited one this afternoon.  The Maya believed that caves were entrances to the underworld, and we saw Mayan artifacts throughout the cave.  I can only imagine how terrifying and magical it would have been to travel through the cave without a flashlight and little understanding of why or how the cave formed.  We also saw lots of bats living deep within the cave, and slid through the mud on our stomachs through the mud to see the skeleton of a peccary that had gotten lost in the cave.

Next, we set up an experiment to study nitrogen deficiencies in the rainforest canopy.  Urine is very high in nitrogen, so we put vials of urine and water in trees and buried in the ground.  If arthropods are deficient in nitrogen, and thus attracted to it, they will be more likely to fall into the nitrogen traps than the water traps.  Tomorrow, we’ll look and see what we caught.

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Pitfall Trap Analysis + Night Hike

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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 🙂
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“SNAAAKE!”

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For our second to last day at Las Cuevas, we wrapped up our arthropod experiment by collecting all the pitfall traps set along the Maya trail yesterday. The majority of the day was dedicated to data analysis and the presentation of our results; there’s nothing quite like having a poster session in the middle of the rainforest.

We also spent a good part of the day discussing illegal extraction from the Chiquibul and the problems with conservation in Belize. I never fully appreciated the intricacies of conservation biology until today. The Chiquibul’s greatest threat is illegal extraction of plants and animals by Guatemalans from villages along the nearby border. Yet the issue of conservation is much greater than that of sustaining the area’s ecology and incorporates complex economic and political landscapes, as well. 

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Central American coral snake (Micrurus nigrocinctus).
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Central American coral snake (Micrurus nigrocinctus).

Since our activities were primarily indoors, the day offered few opportunities for reptile sightings. However, I was excited at the prospect of our first night hike—the evening brings out a number of nocturnal species, transforming the Chiquibul into a completely different habitat than it is during the day. We managed to spot all kinds of creepy crawlies, including spiders the size of your face and a giant roach that emitted a sticky white substance. By the end of the hike, I had nearly given up on searching for reptiles in the leaf-litter and under fallen logs. But at the very end of the trail, we approached a sinkhole; as I peered down I heard a shout of “snaaaake!” I looked down to find the distinctive tri-color banded pattern of the Central American coral snake (Micrurus nigrocinctus) all but a foot away from my boot. The snake was small but could clearly be identified as one of the most venomous snakes found in Central America. Just goes to show that you can never stop looking.

2016

Weird Science! (feat. Urine)

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Today was a lab day primarily. We collected the traps from an experiment we set up yesterday that involved urine and insect death traps. I know it sounds odd, but it was totally normal for a tropical field biologist. The experimental design we used involved placing two pitfalls on tree trunks, one filled with plain soapy water and one filled with urine (common name: pee-pee). We also placed another pair of traps in the leaf litter to catch floor dwelling insects. All the arthropods (common name: creepy crawlies) that made the unfortunate choice of exploring these traps fell to their deaths.

Our aim was to compare the community composition and the species richness (how many unique species) and abundance (how many individual organisms) of both forest canopy and forest floor species. The urine component was put into our design to collect relevant data on the affinity to nitrogen (found in ammonia in urine) of arthropods in each habitat. Here’s a photo of all the morphospecies I identified!

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There are plenty of crickets and their nymphs in this photo, all of which I have not identified to a species level, but rather characterized as unique by certain morphological characters. This process can be difficult because size can vary with age and color/markings with sex. This method of ID is inherently an estimate of true species richness/abundance.

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While it may seem esoteric and boring, the data set we compiled after sixteen hours of sampling was truly enlightening. No single way of looking at this data was 100% correct or incorrect, but depending on the statistical methods our group drew radically different conclusions—just another confounding and thought provoking aspect of scientific methods. Complicated, but never boring, the “telling” of the story completely affects the “message” or “moral” of what you are saying. Even in after just under a day of collection we had a TON of information on our hands and it was up to us entirely to make sense of it. Truly exciting.

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Cave Las Cuevas, Day 5

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Today was interesting. I woke up early to the sounds of the other group that is here. I also did not fall asleep as early as I would have liked because the other group was being loud past 11 pm and I am a light sleeper. So I am kind of grumpy.

Today we wrapped up our trumpet tree projects and then we all peed into two vials. I am impressed by how clear everyone’s urine is. We are a healthy crew. After lunch, we took our helmets and headlamps to the Las Cuevas cave! I’ve been caving before in Idaho as well as Belize. I’ve also been cave diving, which is something I think I much prefer. The added level of danger is quite exciting. Anyway, we met a few bats in the cave and saw a few scorpions. We also encountered a chamber with low oxygen levels, which I definitely felt.

After exiting the caves, we went out onto a trail right near the station and used our urine for an experiment by placing vials of urine and water in trees and on the forest floor. If I haven’t already mentioned, an ancient Mayan site lies right outside the clearing of Las Cuevas. It is believed that the site had been used for ceremonial purposes.

We had a guest lecturer named Boris from FCD, a non-governmental organization that works in this area of Belize. His talk centered on the illegal extraction of resources from the Chiquibul, the research he does, and the social and political conflicts that have arisen from border disputes with Guatemala.

I didn’t see any bees today, probably due to the fact that we spent a large part of the day in the classroom. Tomorrow I will try to attract some bees, if time allows.

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Cave Las Cuevas
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Cave Las Cuevas
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Ant digging, Day 4

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I woke up today to the sound of my alarm and immediately fell back asleep. Instant coffee and sausages helped revive me this morning. We immediately went to the classroom and tried to design experiments that could answer the question as to how young trumpet trees against herbivores because they do not form a symbiosis with Azteca ants until they’re older. We then hit the trails again, though not as intensely as yesterday. We found a line of army ants, discovered a young queen inside a young trumpet tree, and recovered many leaf samples.

After lunch, we stayed in the proximity of Las Cuevas and dug up leaf cutter ant hills. We did so in a way to not kill the queen and allow the colony to recover. We dug vertically down into the soil on the side of the opening of the ant nests until we discovered a chamber containing the fungi and pupae. What’s incredibly neat is that these ants are farmers of the forest. They cut leaves and drag them back to the nest in order to farm this fungus, which can only survive by the aid of these ants. The soldier ants bit Michael, which was pretty funny.

We could hear howling monkeys today. I knew they were farther away than they sounded but I loved listening to them and am hoping we get the chance to see them. The other highlight of my day included seeing the scarlet macaws again. I was inside the building when they flew over and landed in the gutters. I ran over to the bridge between the kitchen and main building to take photos. One of them decided to fly over and pay me a visit. It was AWESOME. I slowly took out my camera and snapped a great photo, which I won’t include here. Find me later in person if you know me and would like to see.

I saw what I believe to be a large bumblebee today, as well as the same little black Euglossini bee. Tomorrow I am setting up my contraption to attract some orchid bees. Right now it is 9:30 pm and I am hitting the hay. I have a 5:30 am wake up call and no desire to get under 8 hours of sleep.

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Fungus that the leaf cutter ants cultivate
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Day 4

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The tiredness continues. Today’s two tasks were to test our four hypotheses related to Cecropia herbivory defense and explore ant nests of different ages.

The Cecropia tree is normally in symbiosis with several species of ant. Their function is to be a defense mechanism against any threat to the integrity of the tree. This mostly means herbivory from various types of organism. However, there is a period when the tree is young prior to the colonization event of the ant population. We explored different ways in which the tree could potentially protect itself in this vulnerable period. After discussing the issue as a group for a while, covering many different possible solutions, we settled on four distinct hypotheses. Briefly, they focused on mimicry, chemical defense, leaf quality, and the predator/herbivore satiation hypothesis.

In long form these were our ideas. Maybe the young Cecropia trees are in some way similar to another species that has it’s own process for herbivory deterrence. Through mimicry, young Cecropia may benefit from the association made by herbivores. Secondly, there could be a chemical defense mechanism that is then replaced by the ants later in life. Thirdly, leaves on juveniles could be of poorer quality so as to deter herbivores, who would be better off selecting other species. Lastly (and the hypothesis I worked on), was herbivore satiation hypothesis. Under this assumption, we would expect to see high numbers of seed and juveniles, with the high number of individuals “flooding the market” and ensuring both sufficient herbivory and a proportion of individuals surviving into maturity (and therefore protection via ants).

After collecting and analyzing our data, we moved on to the ant colony structure. Scott showed us the different stages of nest. We spent the rest of the day looking for the fungus chamber and evading the (amazingly strong) bites of soldier ants.

Tomorrow, we go caving. I’m excited, as I have never done anything of the sort before.