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