This was the only day that was relatively calm so far. Effectively, we only did one activity (which is far less than we usually do) and this was retrieving our samples for our second project on nitrogen limitation in the rainforest. Yes, this is the pee one. After finding and tagging our urine and water vials, we went back to the lab and spent approximately four hours sorting throuhg the insects we found in the liquid, dividing them into different categories based on appearance alone. This meant we were each assigned an insect group, to keep the identification standardized across the whole project.

I was assigned Orthoptera, as this is my regularly-assigned taxon, and this may as well have been the most Orthoptera I saw today. On our morning hike, there were no interesting Orthoptera organisms, though I did catch what seemed like a few quick, small crickets jumping throuhg the leaf litter. The lack of recorded Orthoptera for today may be partially due to the fact our morning hike was short, and I wasn’t paying close and particular attention to the leaves, since we were all preoccuped with collecting our samples.

Halfway through our four-hour analysis, a second group arrived at Las Cuevas Research Station. They were college students, here to study ecology and biology like us. We somehow got offered the opportunity to present our project to them, so we did—standing at the front of the lecture lab, holding a poster titled “To Pee or Not to Pee”, discussing our day-long analysis in front of a group of strangers. They were sympathetic and seemed genuinely interested in our study, which was reassuring and honestly very sweet. It was a good (if not slightly eccentric) introduction to the first outsiders we’d seen in days.

Besides this, it was a quiet day. At about 2 pm, it started raining in traditional rainforest fashion: brief, ephemeral torrents of rain, followed by open blue skies. We all stood on the deck of Las Cuevas and basked in the falling rain.

Today was a good day for Orthoptera. We headed out of Crystal Paradise and down to Las Cuevas, with a few pit stops in between—one of which was Rio-on Pools, a freshwater spring-like area that heavily lent itself to swimming. A cricket exoskeleton, black and white striped, was found there, but this was not the true hotspot of Orthoptera. The latter was at Caracol, a partially excavated Mayan dune. Here, I immediately encountered two grasshoppers, light brown with slightly striped abdomen and femurs. Though I couldn’t identify them in the field, looking at my taxon card they looked almost exactly the same as Lactista azteca, so that’s what I will consider them as. I saw two more of these atop the stones and in the grass of the Mayan structures. I attached a picture of the first view we got of the tall Mayan buildings, since that may have been one of the most breath-taking sights of the day.

Additionally, there was a monkey grasshopper, likely from the family Eumastacinae, on a leaf along one of the trails in Caracol. This one I did identify in the field, and given the distinctive 90 degree angle of the hind legs, I am at pretty sure my labeling is correct.  Elena found a katydid, the first one on the trip so far, which was great as they are by far my favorite Orthoptera. I think it was a leaf-mimic katydid, from the family Pterochrozinae. It did look exacty like a brown leaf, and was quite large, 5 cm long or so. After Caracol, we continued to Las Cuevas, which is beautiful if not slightly primitive in its facilities. A walk in the rainforest refreshed my mind, despite the  exhaustion of having woken up at 5 a.m. At night, we did our first lectures and lessons, and Scott found me a beautiful 7 or 8 cm green katydid he found outside Las Cuevas. A picture is attached of it in a mason jar, and I think it might be a greater angle-wing katydid.

So in short it was a very good day for my crickets and their identifications. Hopefully this streak continues, though I have very little known species to base my identifications off of, and henceforth we have no Google.