Tag Archives: 2016

2016

Trekking, Trapping, and Tick-biting

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Day 3 gave us all a true sense of what hard-core field work is like. The entire day was spent hiking through the forest to set up camera traps. Half of the hike was relatively flat, while the other half was filled with steep ups and downs. Overall, we trekked well over 13 miles.

Before heading out on the trails, we had to decide what we wanted to test using the camera traps. By placing camera traps on both human roads/trails and in naturally open areas, we can explore the differences in species composition and richness along man-made pathways and natural areas. This may demonstrate the effects of human interference on these species measures in the Chiquibul.

We saw no mammals on the hike, which was a bit disappointing but not surprising. As a group of 16 tromping through the forest during the dry season, we make quite a bit of noise, and thus animals can move out of sight long before we arrive. In addition, many mammals are most active at dawn, dusk, or night, and thus spotting mammals during day hikes will be more difficult. I am hoping that we will see at least some mammals during night hikes, in the mornings, or in camera trap images. Some animals that we did see included a plumbeous kite, scarlet macaws, morpho butterflies, and nymphs of an unknown bug species.

I had some crazy mishaps during today’s activities. I must have sat on a congregation of ticks at some point during the hike because I was covered in them. Thankfully, not many had actually bitten me, though the ones that had were relatively difficult to find! Then, once we had returned for the day, I discovered a large red rash going down both my legs. We think it’s just heat rash or something similar, as I feel fine otherwise and it isn’t really painful, but definitely counts as a bit of a mishap!

2016

Day 3: Ouch

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Woke up at before my alarm at 4:50 today. Guess I was too excited for bird watching. Funny thing is that I actually woke up before the birds. Saw a bunch of different birds once they started coming out. Apparently the big dried up tree in front of the main building at Las Cuevas is a popular chill out spot for birds. Social Flycatchers are pretty common over here, they pretty small and I think they’re pretty, they have brown wings and a yellow chest. Parrots were constantly fly overhead. I was lucky enough to see a Plumbeous Kite, which is a hawk looking thing, chase a flycatcher around. After we had breakfast, we saw some pretty rare birds that I can’t really talk about.

Today we set up our camera traps. We put 12 of them out there in the field. We went around the 50 hectare plot trail, the bird tower trail, and the monkey tail trail. All in all we hiked 13.47 miles today. My feet hurt. My brain is switched off. I would write more but nah. Not sure how ready I am for tomorrow.

-Randy

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Camera Traps Abound + >16,700 Steps Before Lunch

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Hello hello everyone! Before I get into any of the day’s activities, I have some very exciting news! Last night, I had two taxa sightings! The first was a black ground beetle (Pterostichus melanarius) in the family Carabidae spotted in the classroom in the building next to ours as it crawled along the walls. The second was a flat faced longhorn beetle (Callipogon barbatus) and was actually in one of my classmate’s hair.

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A banded netwinged beetle (Calopteron discrepans)

Today I was also able to identify three different beetle species. There was another ground beetle, this time of a dark coppery almost black color, that was crawling on the ground near the base of the Bird Tower and a banded netwinged beetle (Calopteron discrepans) near the base of a large fallen tree as well as many fireflies (we captured one and I believe it was the species Ellychnia corrusca within the Lampyridae family based on the stripes on its back and lack of distinct median ridge) flickering about during our hike through the rainforest.

A firefly (Ellychnia)
A firefly (Ellychnia corrusca)

Speaking of which, today we went out into the Chiquibul Forest for the first time and what an experience that was! Over 31,400 steps taken, over 13 miles covered, over 2800 calories burned, and over 120 flights of stairs later, we had set up 12 camera traps to take pictures of the species that roam the area for the next five days. Now I am going to head to bed and get some rest for tomorrow’s activities. Thanks for reading! 🙂

Made it to the top of the Bird Tower!
Made it to the top of the Bird Tower!
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Bootcamp Las Cuevas, Day 3

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I am dead.

I’ve been on some intense hikes in my life, but I doubt I have ever walked as far as I did today, while wearing rubber boots. 13.25 miles in the final count. I do not have blisters. I do not have sunburn. I did not receive any mosquito bites. I can finally join club “I Found a Tick.”  I don’t believe I have ever sweated so much in my life. Today I swam through the slicks of perspiration drenching my body.

I did all of this to set up our 12 camera traps. Hopefully we capture some interesting Belizean animals. Even though I am tired and lying in my bed wanting a good night’s sleep I know I wont get because Mandy snore, I enjoyed my day. After a few miles hiking through the humid forests, I began to acclimate myself to the environment and enjoy the sights, sounds, and smells of the Chiquibul. This is an amazing place for sure. Also, no bees. Sorry.

I am writing a shorter blog than usual but I will be back tomorrow!

P.S. To my family: I am not actually dead. I’m okay. As my mother would say to me “Buck up kid!”

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The 319 crew trekked to each green and red sticky note, accumulating 13.25 miles of hiking.
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Randy is reading out the GPS coordinates of one of our last camera traps.
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Caracol and things that went wrong, Day 2

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The day started bright and early with a cornucopia of fried dough, syrup, and coffee at 6 am. I had only received about five and a half hours of sleep but I did not wake up or stir at all during the night. I found myself sleepy for nearly the entire day, but we get a break tonight to catch up on our sleep.

I saw my first bee today! There were a number of dark bees feeding from the nectar feeders at Crystal Paradise. They appeared to be bees belonging to the tribe Euglossini. The only thing that confused was the fact that they did not appear iridescent or metallic. That is one of the characteristics that define the Euglossini genus. However, it could be entirely possible that these bees belonged to the genus Eufrasia, which is another genus that belongs to the Euglossini tribe. Those bees tend to be darker and black, with any metallic coloring located on their heads. The other distinguishing feature of the Euglossini tribe is the enlarged hind tibias that male bees have to store and carry nectar. I took a few photos that showed exactly this.

After we packed up all of our things, we headed out in our van. I fell asleep instantaneously and missed most of the drive. I only woke up a few times and was lucky that I got to see a coati walking along the road. We arrived at Caracol, an ancient Mayan archaeological site, and headed out to the ruins. We climbed the tallest man-made structure in Belize, and it was built about 1500 years ago! Everyone was sweating a lot under the hot sun and the strong humidity. That was when I noticed these tiny little black insects hovering around and landing on people’s skin. When I got a closer look, I saw that they were sweat bees. Sweat bees belong to the Halictidae family and are attracted to human perspiration. The ones I saw were also very tiny, but very distinctly bee.

After we ate lunch at the ruins, we packed up the van yet again with the plan of going swimming in some pools. Of course, this was never meant to happen. Our van broke down and we had to be rescued by those residing at Las Cuevas. We packed our people and gear onto two pickup trucks and endured a bumpy 45-minute ride to the research station. Upon arrival, I was immersed in the sounds of the forest. Currently I am writing this blog outside on the porch as we wait for dinner and am listening to the myriad bird sounds emanating from the trees. I may be dirty, but I am content.

I can’t promise any photos. Cross your fingers that the Ethernet will load them!

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A black species of Euglossini bee. Taken at Crystal Paradise.
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Africanized honey bees
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Caracol
Caracol
Caracol
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The 319 crew minus Scott at Caracol. PC: Scott Solomon
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Day 3

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Well we all died physically today. I believe that the final amount of miles hiked was a little bit above 13. My feet are destroyed. The back of my right knee feels like a pulled a muscle in it. I have a bug bite with dried blood on it and a bruise. But I don’t consider today a bad day by any stretch of the imagination. Why? Because I spotted on the orchids on my taxonomic ID sheet. (Oncidium altissimum) It was so so exciting, I can’t even put it elegantly into words. These are the moments when it becomes painfully obvious that I have to be an EBIO. The major is all that I am interested in. Of course, I also saw the large green bromeliad (as well as a couple other structurally similar bromeliads), further reminding me to look for a book in LCRS. I think what my new strategy is going to be is to try to assess my findings via my pictures after the day is done. Especially on today’s hike, we were moving so quickly that I couldn’t figure out my epiphytes in time.

As for our project, we decided to look at how man-made clearings and natural clearings compare. We picked quite the variety of sites, which is why we ended up walking so far during the day. It took us so long that when we got back the station, it had been dark for hours, (I think we all thanked the EBIO gods when Scott said that tomorrow wouldn’t be nearly as much walking.)

Tomorrow we focus on ants, having just listened to the taxonomic briefing on the topic. We don’t yet know what the two projects will be but they will be great. I have no doubt that this will get me even more excited to take insect biology in the fall with Dr. Solomon.

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Day 2

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Our first real day has been quite eventful. Most importantly, I got to get a sense of the species composition of epiphytes in Belize. I wish I had the ability to revise my species ID card. It’s so difficult to determine what is going to be of high prevalence in a specific (and unfamiliar) region when we are so far away. I keep seeing this large green bromeliad on many different types of trees. I hope that the Ethernet comes through tonight when I upload my blog so that I can look it up. On the bright side, I also think that I saw an Androlepis skinneri on one of the trees in near the Mayan city of Caracol.

Visiting those ruins was one of the most sweltering experiences of my life. Still, no one was going to let sweat hinder their willingness to see Mayan ruins. The scale of what was accomplished never ceases to amaze. I think that everyone in the group was feeling similarly. Everywhere I went, the large green bromeliad taunted me. I keep forgetting to go look at the books available at the Las Cuevas Research Station. I have one on orchids but I don’t expect that it will be utilized or all that helpful.

I am mentally preparing myself for tomorrow. I think it will be a big day of hiking. I’m not sure that I’m physically prepared I am. We will see tomorrow.

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Smile for the Camera

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Today’s task seemed simple: form a hypothesis and set up 12 camera traps in the forest surrounding LCRS. 

Twelve hours later, our work is finally complete, but it was much easier said than done. After a 5:30am birdwatching session and a hot cup of tea, we set off to develop our experiment. We opted to test the impact of human pathways on local species richness and composition in the Chiquibul by setting up camera traps along roads and trails, as well as in natural clearings. In five days, we’ll collect these traps and see what diverse organisms they’ve managed to catch on film.

The morning’s hike seemed manageable on a map, but many hours and some (incredible) scarlet macaw sightings later, we had set up only half of our traps. By our 3pm lunch break, I had walked 7.8 miles or 16, 652 steps. Talk about a morning workout. 

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View from Bird Tower near LCRS.

Right before lunch, we ended our work at the Las Cuevas Bird Tower. The rickety tower stands at over 600 m of elevation, and the view is almost worth the steep hike up. (Note to entrepreneurs: the Bird Tower would be an ideal location for opening an ice cream stand).

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Sumichrast’s skink (Eumeces sumichrasti).

Despite sweat and blisters, we loaded up on lunch and set off on the Monkey Tail Trail to install the remaining traps in clearings and a natural stream. The main reptile for today was the Sumichrast’s skink (Eumeces sumichrasti), an orange and black lizard with a bright blue tail. I saw evolution in action when we caught a blue-tailed skink; the lizard quickly shed its skin and darted off, leaving the wriggling blue tail in our palms (and the rest of the animal out of sight). 

With our twelfth and final camera trap set in a mud wallow for a prospective tapir sighting, we finally trudged our way home. Though we were all exhausted and covered in sweat (and ticks, in some cases), I found some  peace in the pitch black of the forest. The trees of the canopy arched over the trail to form a tunnel, just like the trees at home on University Boulevard. And just as the blinking lights of the city lead me home at Rice, the twinkling eyes of spiders lit up the trail with pinpricks of yellow light, finally leading us back to Las Cuevas.

2016

Ow

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This morning started out so promising when we saw some Scarlett Macaws. Things went downhill (and uphill and downhill and up some larger hills) from there.

Today we set up camera traps to answer our question “what is the impact of human pathways on local species composition and richness in Chiquibul Forest?” We will look specifically at roads and pathways vs. natural clearings. We had 12 camera traps to set up and we were very ambitious in how far away we wanted to put each camera from one another. Our hike lasted all day (with a short break for lunch and bandages at 3), and we hiked a total of 13.47 miles (and apparently some 120 flights of stairs according to Adrienne’s fitbit).


During the hike I saw thousands of arachnids scurrying underfoot, and one huge wolf spider (about 3 in including its legs). We also became very acquainted with our new best friend: the tick. I pulled about 5 or 6 off of myself before dinner.

Elaborate spider web along the trail.
Elaborate spider web along the trail.

During the hike, my feet started killing me around 12pm when I realized that the pads of my heels were rubbing against my sock in a weird way. I spent the rest of the hike with moleskin sweating off of me as we hiked up to our highest point of 685 meters in elevation. We saw some fabulous long wing butterflies at the bird tower observation deck, which was our highest camera trap point.

There was much sweat and pain, so I certainly hope we get something good from these camera traps. Next stop: ant experiments.

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Day 3: Camera traps and hiking

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Today was our first day in the field. The project of the day was to set up 12 camera traps around Las Cuevas that will record information about the animals that are active in the area. The traps will take pictures of animals for 5 days, until our last day at LCRS. This information will allow us to make inferences about the number of species in the area and where they are most likely to be found. We’re hoping that we placed the traps in such a way so they’ll capture lots of small animals and maybe some big cats, like jaguars or ocelots.

One of the best parts of the day today was seeing a group of scarlet macaws fly right by where we were. Scarlet macaws are really rare in Belize, and are threatened by poachers that take them from their nests. Hopefully increased awareness about the problem will help to decrease poaching. Tourists should avoid taking pictures with macaws that aren’t in zoos or otherwise obtained legally in order to decrease demand for macaws.

We also saw a lot of tree species along the paths today including bastard mahogany, cedar, cecropia, fiddlewood, gumbo-limbo, give-and-take palm, mahogany, chicle, and strangling fig. Some of the chicle trees were extremely tall, and it was interesting to see the marks from the chicleros go up the tree as far as we could see.

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Give-and-take palm – note the sharp spines!
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All of the mahogany was small due to logging in the past
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Chicle tree featuring scars from chicleros and Randy for scale

Over the course of the day we walked almost 14 miles (and in rainboots no less!) so it’s safe to say I’ll sleep well tonight. Tomorrow we’re going to learn a lot about ants. Turns out they have a pretty advanced societal structure!