Tag Archives: Day 6

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Day 6: Belize, you look good

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Got to see a toucan today even though I woke up late for bird watching. I’m glad I finally got to see a toucan, and I can say I have seen the two most iconic birds here at Las Cuevas. I do feel bad for not actually getting up at 5:00a.m for bird watching, but I tried very hard.

The bird tower hike was very VERY tiring, but once I got to the top of the tower, it was all worth it. The view was such a pretty sight, and the sunset was great as well. Got a couple photos during the golden hour which only lasted for about 10 minuets. That’s nice. The walk back was definitely faster, and it probably would have been faster to take that route.

As we were walking along the shortcut road that leads to the bird tower, I saw more and more lichens. We went down this trail to tackle our afternoon experiment, and along the way I looked for epiphytes, which were everywhere. Bromeliads were everywhere as they usually are and so were these never ending loops of lianas.

After lectures, I just enjoyed the view with Elizabeth, and we talked about the day. We looked at a moth that had she had caught, and she would not playing with him. Before going to bed, I talked to Pierce about how he has an eye of an eagle, and how awesome it is for him to just see lots of things at night. Today was definitely the longest day, but a good one. See you tomorrow as our stay at Las Cuevas winds down L.

Picture: View from the bird tower

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Day 6: *Drum roll please* Tropical Field Biology Presents:

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5/19/19: Today, we started our day with an early morning research project. We were looking at how hurricane impacts areas within the Chiquibull, specifically how they impact plant diversity.  We were able to create a poster and present it all before lunchtime. I am not going to lie it felt pretty productive to get that all done in one morning.

Next, we had a second research project for the afternoon where we looked at the relationship of Cecropia trees and Aztec ants. We wanted to know if trees that were not colonized by the ants (ants provide tree protection against attack from herbivores) had tougher leaves to prevent herbivory. We are still working on the project, but I will keep y’all updated on the results.

I think my favorite part of the day was overlooking the entire Chiquibul forest from the bird tower. The sun was just starting to set and the dimming sunlight made for a beautiful sight. To see nature undisturbed for miles upon miles, it was incredible. I also got to take some nice photos with a great view which is always a plus.

A view from the bottom looking up on the bird tower

As for my beloved arachnids, not much has changed. We saw a small Florida Bark scorpion (C. gracilis), orb weaver spider, and a few Red-Rumped (B. vagans) tarantulas today. However, something cool that I have noticed on night hikes is the sheer number of spiders on the forest floor. As we walk with our headlamps, their eyes are illuminated and reflect back towards us. In fact, we thought we saw a wolf spider with a glittery back, but we soon realized, it was not glitter at all. The spider was carrying hundreds of young spiders! With the way things are going, I am excited to start another project tomorrow.

On the back of this spider, there appears to be “green spots.” Those spots are not spots at all. They are eyes of small spiders on its back!

Wish me luck!

-Bella

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Peelieze

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Today we spent the majority of the day picking up our vials of pee and water from the other day, and then brought them back to the lab to sort into morphological species. It was a very long process, that involved us having to dump vials of our pee through a sieve into the toilet and sort through the insects we found. While working on the experiment the other school group showed up, so we got to present our final poster to them.

 

While working on the experiment, it started raining and then actually pouring and we all ran outside to experience rain in the rainforest. It was so exciting to see one of the first big rains of the rainy season, which also meant that the nuptial flight of some insects, such as termites, began.

Also, today when we first got on the trail we spotted a frog in the leave litter that I got to hold, and it was super cute. We also found a smooth anole as well that was the same as the one I saw the night before. I identified it as a smooth anole but didn’t want to hold it, since it could bite and was thrashing its head around, I did pet its head and its face was pretty cute.

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Welcome to Peelize and Anoles Don’t Like Me

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Day 6: May 20th 2018, Las Cuevas

This morning we started bird watching again at 5:30. We saw a toucan, Oropendola, and 2 new parrots (the White-fronted parrots).  We also heard howler monkeys calling tis morning, but they were likely about 2 miles away as the call was very faint. After breakfast, we tarted data collection for our second project.  As we collected our urine and water traps, we observed some interesting fauna.  A Mexican Tree Frog hopped right in front of us on the path.  We also saw a smooth anole which tried to bite Professor Solomon and me to no avail.  Anoles appears to be feisty towards me.  

After we collected the urine and water traps, we organized the contents into categories like beetles, arachnids, etc.  We all then specialized in a particular type of organism and then identified different species using the morphospecies concept which involved using physical characteristics to classify organisms. We then determine the number of different morphospecies present in each vial of each plot and allocate the average species richness of ground water, ground urine, canopy water, and canopy urine.  We we analyzed our data we found that there was an 8x greater arthropod average species richness in the ground water vs. the canopy water, a 2x greater arthropod average species richness in the canopy urine than the canopy water, and a 1.5x greater arthropod average species richness in the ground urine vs the canopy. 

Rain break! It started to poor at the station and we all became officially officially inducted as TBFs by getting rained on in the rainforest. It was a satisfying break from the heat and humidity…. Aaaand back to work.

What we concluded was that there are more arthropods on the ground rather than in the water. We also concluded that nitrogen is a limiting nutrient in both the canopy and the ground, but it is. Greater limiting nutrient in the canopy rather than the ground.  We presented our finding to Professor Solomon and a new group of students that had just arrived from University of Southern Mississippi.  The it was already dinner time.  We had chicken, beans, slaw, and tortillas. To wrap up the day was lectures on Mammals, Reptiles, and Tropical Parasites, Diseases, and Medicinal Plants.  As we were getting ready for bed we found a black scorpion and another small anole.  Every time I got near it or touched it,  it freaked out and thrashing in our hands, but apparently it was fine with everyone else.  I guess anoles just don’t like me.  That fine, I don’t have to like them either then.  

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Day 6: Welcome to Peelize!

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It’s felt like we’ve been here for months, and when new faces showed up at the Research Station, we naturally told them: welcome to Peelize and continued to talk about our urines for the next half-hour.

48 hours since the start of our pee experiment, this morning was the deadline for the end of our experiment. We started on trail at 9 am to pick up the pitfall traps we have placed on the forest floors and in the canopy two days prior. Of the 40 pitfall traps, most had all sorts of organisms in it, mostly arthropods like spiders, beetles, bees, ants, and grasshoppers.

 

We then sorted individuals into morpho-species, or species distinguished by their morphological characters. For example, I was the ‘expert’ in charge of assigning morpho-species to bees, and found a total of 2 morpho-species of bees that we referred to as Bee A and Bee B. Bee A had a ‘green v-neck’ on the back of its thorax while Bee B did not and was about 3-4 times smaller. At the end of our sorting, we analyzed our data and found that proportionally speaking, there were more arthropods in the nitrogen pitfall traps in the canopy than there were in the forest floor. Our main conclusion was that nitrogen is likely to be more of a limiting nutrient in the canopy than it is in the forest floor.

Afterwards, we presented our data to fellow students that arrived at the station from Mississippi, starting with a warm welcome to Peelize.

 

Bonus: Caught a brown anole in the forest!