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The Season Finale: Reflections from Belize

June 2, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

These past two weeks, I have had the incredible privilege of being completely immersed in nature across two distinct, yet similarly vibrant ecosystems in Belize: the tropical rainforest and the coral reef.

Although the tropical rainforest and coral reef were very distinct ecosystems, I still noticed several similarities. Although both of these ecosystems—and the research stations we spent our time at—seemed significantly isolated from civilization, they were nevertheless both suffering from the impacts of human disruptions. At Las Cuevas Research Station, located in the heart of the Chiquibul Forest, we learned all about threats of deforestation and poaching (especially of the endangered Scarlet Macaw) leading to habitat loss and the unethical stripping of animals from their environment for the benefit of humans. Similarly, at Glover’s Reef, we saw firsthand how even a remote island is not immune to the impacts of human pollution and disruption. Especially on our last day at Glover’s Reef during our morning trash pick-up, we saw the countless amounts of trash that had accumulated on the edges of the island, especially in the coral graveyard. Furthermore, we learned that fish, such as surgeonfish, are often illegally harvested to be entered into the illegal pet trade.

Another factor that I noticed could be both a similarity and a difference was the structural complexity of these ecosystems. The rainforest ecosystem is vertically stratified, with different layers—from the forest floor to the canopy—allowing the development of niche specialization and a high degree of biological diversity. Likewise, although marine rather than terrestrial, I noticed that the coral reef also had different components culminating in structural complexity, such as the surface, nooks, and crevices.

This course went above and beyond my expectations. Before going on this trip, I just had a vague idea of a rainforest and the ocean, but being actually immersed in these ecosystems was truly surreal. Seeing all of the cool species that I’ve only read about or seen in documentaries with my own eyes was incredible—I even got to hold a Scarlet Macaw feather! Also, I got to see so many of my rainforest mammal species at the Belize Zoo, and saw some Blue Tangs in the coral reef!!

My favorite part of the course was, as cheesy as it may sound, getting to know all of my fellow Tropical Field Biologists! In fact, today, a group of us (Lily, Emily, Sadhana, and I) remaining in Houston for the summer grabbed dinner and boba together! Post-Belize food was heavenly, although I must admit, the food provided to us over the trip was significantly better than I had expected. Throughout the trip, I acquired a taste for plantains and hot sauce. Before this, I had not even touched plantains that were served in Rice serveries. Now, you know what my staple meal is going to be once school restarts in the fall.

On the other hand, my least favorite part of the course, I think, would be being eaten alive by bugs both in the rainforest and the reef. I am especially traumatized by that one night at Las Cuevas when Emily and I accidentally left our dorm room light on and returned to about 20 bugs buzzing around the light… I remember us trying to ignore them at first, but it quickly turned into a bug elimination frenzy, as the buzzing of the bugs (especially near my ears!) became unbearable. We learned our lesson about turning off the lights the hard way, but we know now. :,)

I learned SO many new, incredible things on this trip, but the three most notable things were:

1) The symbiotic relationship between Cecropia trees and Azteca ants. It was so fascinating (yet anxiety-inducing) to see all of the Azteca ants swarm out from the tree trunk to protect the Cecropia tree (which Dr. Solomon had macheted down), and the countless chambers within the tree. Without knowing anything about this tree, I would have never imagined that it would be a “high-rise apartment complex” for ants.

2) Human impact is everywhere. Even on remote islands, the impact of human pollution is still transferred. It was sad but incredibly powerful to see the contrast between the black and white fossilized corals and the vibrantly colored plastic pollution on the coral graveyard.

3) I am not immune to motion sickness nor sea sickness. I thought I would be different, but snorkeling and the boat ride almost took me out every time… Heat exhaustion and the side effects of drinking seawater (on accident) were not a joke and were quite a combination. So my biggest takeaway was: when in the ocean, do not drink seawater and drink lots and lots of (fresh!) water whenever possible.

Overall, Belize was such an incredible experience, and this will be a trip that I reminisce about often. When I close my eyes, I can almost still feel the breeze from the ocean as I lay on the dock at Glover’s Reef, or I can hear the screeches of the bats as I lay on the picnic table at Las Cuevas.

As I return to civilization, I’m eternally grateful for things I took for granted, such as cold water, clean clothes, and a sand-free bed. I’m now confident to call myself a tropical field biologist.

If any of you reading this blog right now are contemplating taking this course: take it. Take it and run. You will have the most amazing two weeks of your life that you cannot gain elsewhere.

Now for the last time, signing off:

With love,

Sohee

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Day 15: Leaving Belize

June 1, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

Today was a bittersweet day, as we had to leave Glover’s Reef but also got to return to the comfort of our homes. After a quick breakfast (of toast and jam), we quickly loaded our suitcases onto the boat then boarded, leaving the dock around 6:15 AM.

During the boat ride back to land, there was apparently another dolphin sighting, but I did not get to spot it, which was kind of disappointing but I was able to see one from last time, so I wasn’t too sad about it. As we traversed through the water, I tried to soak up the gorgeous scenery with my eyes one last time — when again will I be able to see such elaborate mixing of hues in the ocean, from emerald green, to aqua blue, to deep blue?

This time, I was determined to keep my seasickness under control, so I put on a seasickness patch (obtained kindly from Claire C) yesterday night, the magic motion drops (from Dr. Solomon), and intensely stared at the horizon. Of course, not all of the symptoms were eliminated, but this time with all of the preparation, it was manageable, and we successfully made it back onto mainland Belize at around 9 AM. When we arrived, the van was waiting for us to take us back to the airport. But before getting on the bus, a group of us took a trip to the restroom inside of the hotel, and we were all so joyful to see a flushing toilet after our weeklong experience with Clivus.

The bus then took us to the airport, where we then checked in and made our way to the gates. Since we had a light breakfast, we all grabbed some food for lunch before our flight departed at 12 PM. I got a sandwich and a bottle of Sprite to spend all of my remaining Belizean cash. Having an ice-cold soda after a week of straight-up room-temperature or even warm water felt so good! We were truly returning back to civilization — a world with hot showers, clean clothes, cold beverages, Wi-Fi, and air conditioning.

On the plane, I took a straight 2.5 hour nap (except for when the flight attendant was handing out Stroopwafels). When we landed, I already missed Belize, but I was also excited to finally be back in Texas. We then took the bus to ABL, where we returned our supplies (sleeping bag, caving helmet, dive light, headlamp). It was a full-circle moment, as we departed from ABL altogether, and we returned back to ABL (mostly altogether).

We all left the classroom one-by-one, and it was sad to see everyone leave, but a few of us are staying in Houston and are planning to meet up for dinner soon, which I am excited for! These past two weeks have been incredible, and I am so glad that I decided to go on the trip. Truly un-Belize-able.

I will see you guys in my final blog post.

Until then,

Sohee

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Day 14: Last Full Day in Belize

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

Today was the last full day in Belize. It is surreal how fast time flew by during these two weeks. Every day was packed full with numerous engaging activities, and I truly learned so so much about the rainforest and coral reef ecosystems during this trip.

This morning started off with breakfast per usual, and then the class met up at 8 AM in the wet lab for the trash pickup around the island. Dr. Evans and Dr. Solomon challenged us as TFBs to extend our scientific critical thinking skills even for trash picking. Therefore, our scientific question was “How does trash distribution differ between unprotected vs. protected areas at Glover’s Reef?” We predicted that the unprotected area would have higher trash density due to the ocean current pushing the trash directly onto the land.

We had 6 giant trash bags, and those bags were quickly filled up, which was astonishing. Also, we had a quadrant to sample 3 sites within each location (semi-protected, unprotected, protected) which we further analyze with our phones after data collection.

We first started off at the semi protected area in front of our dorms, and I noticed that the main type of trash found here was bottle caps. Then, we moved onto the unprotected area (coral graveyard). This area had the highest amount of plastic pollution, with the most prominent types of trash being plastic water bottles and stray sandals. Both of our designated trash bags for this area were all full when we had not even cleaned 1/3 of the area, which was quite unfortunate. I wished there had been more trash bag to fully clean up the pollution, or there to be less plastic pollution emitted in general, but nevertheless we had to stop and move on to our final area, which was the protected mangroves.

After the trash collection, the class promptly met up in the wet lab to start analyzing our data (pictures from the quadrats) and creating the poster. I also adored the title for this poster which was “Getting Waste(d): Trashy Day at Glover’s Reef.” Our results did indeed align with our prediction, with the unprotected areas having the highest proportion of trash. However, the error bars manually calculated and added on overlapped qutie significantly, indicating that no meaningful conclusion could be drawn. Since this is only a pilot study with many limitations, I hope to replicate this set up on a future study with more trash bags and more time duration granted. Although we filled up all six bags to the top, it seemed like we barely made a dent in the trash pile on the island, which was quite disappointing.

In the afternoon though, we got to dissect the lionfish that Dr. Solomon and Dr. Evans had been spearing and gathering for us to dissect (and eat). It was quite gruesome opening up the stomach lining and the organs, as well as decapitating it, but I feel like this really gave me a better sense of anatomy in fish. Once we cut open the stomach of our lionfish, there were four small fish inside it, one of which Sam suspected to be a juvenile yellowhead wrass. The rest of them were pretty digested though, we made it pretty difficult to tell, but they were all about 2 cm in length.

While dissecting the lionfish, I thought about how cool it would be to dissect a surgeonfish — my taxon group. However, I know it won’t be possible on this trip, since only lionfish are able to be speared due to them being an invasive species. Perhaps in the future, a surgeonfish dissection opportunity will come to me!

After dissection, Dr. Solomon and Dr. Evans made a filet with the lionfish mixed in with dip ingredients such as lime and onions and chips. It was pretty delicious, but I could barely taste and notice the lionfish, as most of the flavor was coming from the citrus itself. Also, as a further bonus, we discovered the staff cutting up coconuts, and they kindly sliced up many coconuts for each of us to try (+ the professors)! Although I don’t really like coconut, the coconut water was refreshing and the flesh was yummy.

Before dinner, a lot of us went to the dock to enjoy the last sunset before we leave tomorrow, which was quite bittersweet. The view of the water and sky from the dock is truly surreal, and I know I will not be able to forget this view. These two weeks have been filled with so much memories, and I will miss Belize and being altogether as TFBs so much.

With love,

Sohee

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Day 13: MPAyyyee & Bonefish!

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

Today started with a class discussion at 8 AM to plan out our project for the day, which was to compare reef health (coral species richness, fish species richness, presence of algal overgrowth, coral bleaching) between MPAs (marine protected areas) and non-MPAs. In order to do this, our class split into seven groups, and each surveyed different sites at four locations (two non-MPAs, two MPAs) using quadrats. We laid down the quadrats and took pictures of them at three sites per location. Since I’m unable to duck dive, Lily took on the role of placing and retrieving the quadrats while I was in charge of documentation with the underwater digital camera.

I started to get nauseous again despite trying Dr. Solomon’s magic seasickness drops. Nevertheless, I persevered and finished collecting the data needed for our project. We surveyed in the ocean from 9 AM to 12 PM. No surgeonfish seen during this snorkel though, which was quite a bummer.

While we were returning, though, Noelle spotted a dolphin in the water! Although I wasn’t feeling the best, seeing the dolphin immediately brightened up my day — it was so close to the boat!!

After this, we had lunch, which was noodles and soy sauce. Then we met back at the wet lab to analyze our pictures from the survey and create/present a poster based on our findings. Our results suggested a trend toward higher species richness and fish abundance in MPAs, which aligned with our hypothesis that MPAs would have higher biodiversity and better reef health. I must say, I am quite proud of our poster title: MPAyyyee where my corals at? I think our creative freedom really shined through on this one.

As a bonus, one of the staff members caught a bonefish and kindly showed it to us — and even let us touch it! Instead of being scaly as I had expected, it was rather smooth and slimy, which was a surprising texture. We released it back into the water, but I have hope that one of us TFBs will be able to catch it with bare hands before we leave. Will it happen? Find out tomorrow!

With love,

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Day 12: More Parrotfish and Hat Misfortunes

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

After breakfast, we met in the wet lab in order to finish analyzing our parrotfish data from yesterday and to compile it all into a poster. Emily took on the visual illustrations for the four kinds of parrotfish surveyed in this project which looked amazing. We actually got the poster finished in under 2 hours which was a new record time. I think our poster devising and presenting skills have definitely leveled up during our time here in Belize.

During the poster presentation out on the dock though, Elise’s hat got blown into the ocean, which then she immediately dived in to save. Little did I know, she would not be the only one jumping in the ocean to save her cap…

After the poster, we went to the mangroves and seagrass to catch any organisms we could find. We found grass, some crustaceans, arthropods, small anchovy-like fish, and a snail. We had tools such as two small nets, two trays (one of them had two trays stuck together), and some tongs to aid us in our harvest, but the process was very difficult regardless. At one point though, Claire D caught four of the small fish back to back to back which was so impressive! I tried to catch them with my hands, but they were too fast for me… After our harvest was over, we went back to the wet lab to take a closer look at the samples. I was especially intrigued to look at the snail (that Lily caught) under the microscope, as I could see it moving within the shell.

After this, we had sandwiches for lunch which was absolutely delicious. Then, at 1:30 PM, the class took a trip to the coral graveyards. We got to see countless fossilized/calcified corals, such as brain corals, staghorn corals, seafan, and even a conch. It was incredibly powerful to see the contrast between the vibrantly colored human plastic pollution and the black/white fossilized corals. It truly reminded me of the consequences of anthropogenic actions on the environment, and it was eye-opening to see that with my very own eyes.

Around 3 PM, we began presentations starting off with Claire C’s taxon presentation about sharks and rays. But the power shut off towards the end of her lecture, so the rest of the presentations were postponed until 5 PM. In the meantime, some of us went to the dock to lay down and sunbath, and my hat got blown off by the wind into the ocean. I, left with no other choice, jumped in and swam to retrive my poor hat.

At 5 PM, we resumed with the rest of the presentations, such as Emily’s piscivorous fish presentation and Ian’s topic lecture about the evolution and ecology of angelfish.

We then had dinner, which was chicken soup with rice. I added some hot sauce in it to add a little kick, and it was perfect.

After, at 7:30 PM, the class met up for an optional night fishing, since night snorkeling had gotten canceled due to the strong winds making the snorkeling conditions rather unsafe. I didn’t have much expectations for it since our tools were a hanging dive light and two tiny nets, but to my surprise, our class did a spectacular job! Not only did we catch several shrimp and small fish, but we also caught a glass eel and a squid!! The glass eel was very silly to look at as it looked like a clear noodle with cartoon eyes. The highlight though, was the squid caught by Claire D. We put it in a bucket for observation, and we actually watched it squirt ink, which turned the entire bucket black! Also, when we were playing around with it with the net, the squid actually changed colors to camouflage with its own ink speckles!

Since today was mainly land-based, there was no surgeonfish spotting, but maybe I will be able to see one again tomorrow!

I’m not quite sure what the day will look like tomorrow, but I will keep you guys updated! 🙂

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Day 11: Snorkeling and Some Lionfish!

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

Today was Day 11 in Belize and our second full day at Glover’s Reef. The day started at 7 AM as per usual with breakfast. Then at 8 AM, the class met in the wet lab to discuss the project for our day, which was to examine the feeding behavior of parrotfish. Our class split into several groups, with typically 2 groups examining one species, such as spotlight, red banded, red tailed. Lily & I and Sadhana & Adam were responsible for surveying the seagrass patch near the dock to look for red tailed parrotfish. Sadhana & Adam took on the left side, while we took on the right. We snorkeled from 10 AM to 11 AM, but Lily & I were unsuccessful in finding redtailed parrotfish. However, we were able to see swarms of the smaller fish and a shark lurking around the seagrass which was astonishing! We did see a couple of vertically striped fish swimming around though, but they did not look like parrotfish. We got pretty desperate and started chasing them around and recording footage though. Also, since the fish were quite translucent and a little far away, all of the video footage did not turn out too well.

When everyone returned from their respective surveying area, we washed all of our gear, rested a little bit, then headed into lunch. During the transition period to lunch, Sadhana, Elise, Claire C, Ian, and I went out into the dock and had a relaxing time. However, random items (such as Sadhana’s peanut cap, my Haribo jelly wrapper) kept being blown into the ocean, and Sadhana kindly kept taking one for the team and jumped into the ocean to fetch those items. Next time, I promised to be the one jumping into the water to retrieve something.

Although I was feeling fine initially before the snorkel, my nausea emerged immediately again after lunch. Since the class was meeting back up at 1:30 PM for snorkel part 2 (way longer, on a boat), I informed Dr. Evans of my condition, and then napped for an hour to see if I would feel better enough to go out to snorkel again. Spoiler alert: I did not make it to the second snorkel because my nausea stayed at a constant level.

From 1:30 PM to 4 PM, I slept to recover while the others snorkeled in two spots for 45 minutes each on a boat ride. I’m sad I missed it, but I really don’t think I could have physically made it through the 2.5 hour session. I’m really hopeful for the future activities though. I will be drinking plenty of water and electrolytes to manage my physical state.

On the positive side though, I got to observe the dissection and freezing of the lionfish that Dr. Evans and Dr. Solomon had spearheaded from the snorkel while we were analyzing the footage we had collected. The mature one was pretty wrangled with the spear, as Dr. Evans had speared the fish through the head. The juvenile one was still flopping around, so we put them both into the freezer. Dr. Evans said we will be eating them sometime, so I’m intrigued by that. If I see a mystery fish in the menu at one point though, I will know what it is.

After dinner, we had a presentation from the manager of Glover’s Reef regarding WCS (Wildlife and Conservation Society) and subsequent presentations from the residing marine biologist and the Coast Guard. I was intrigued to hear about Glover’s Reef’s history and the conservation work associated with WCS and Glover’s. Also, I was fascinated by how Glover’s serves (though at a lesser extent than other islands) as a nesting site for sea turtles due to the availability of sand.

Then, we dove straight into class presentations, starting off with my taxon presentation about surgeonfish. After, Sam briefed the class about his taxon, which was wrasses, and Noelle presented about the ecology and evolutionary biology of surgeonfish. I was fascinated by how although I thought surgeonfish changed colors primarily for mating, Noelle found that the surgeonfish changed colors to transition between day and night.

Although I did not get to see surgeonfish today, it was really fun to talk to my classmates about surgeonfish and listen to Noelle’s topic lecture about surgeonfish as well.

Tomorrow, we are planning to do a seagrass hike and visit the coral graveyard. Well then, I will see you guys tomorrow!

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Day 10: Snorkel and Fun

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

Today was our first full day on Glover’s Reef. We headed over to breakfast at 7 AM, and almost stepped on multiple hermit crabs and said hello to several coconut crabs along the way. After breakfast, we changed into our diving gear, then headed over to the dock at 8 AM where Dr. Evans and Dr. Solomon were waiting for us. We began with a swim test where we all, in pairs, swam to Dr. Solomon. Then, we all swam to the patch reef to look for species from our taxon.

We were all each responsible for checking on our buddy as we swam, so that is what my buddy (Ian) and I did. Mostly due to my inefficient swimming, we were quite a bit behind the others for a while, but we were eventually able to catch up. We ran into Dr. Evans, who then pointed out some baby parrotfish among the reef and grabbed a queen conch for us to see!

Shortly after, we all started to head back to the dock, which was quite honestly farther than I anticipated. I started to get nauseous in the middle of my swim back, but nevertheless made it back to land. Dr. Evans told me that it may be due to ingesting too much seawater and advised me to drink lots of water and electrolytes for me to recover before our next snorkel at the aquarium at 1:30 PM. Since we had around 3.5 hours until our next snorkel, I napped for about an hour after drinking electrolytes (which was very kindly provided by Lily) to try to minimize my nausea.

At 1:30 PM, we all went on a boat ride to the aquarium to play “Pokemon Scan” (identifying our taxon). On the way, we saw two separate resort-style islands, where there was a fancy boat parked at the dock. We got out at our first snorkel site, and we saw multiple cool species such as a nurse shark, a colony of blue tangs, some parrotfish, and many many corals!

Also, I saw a school of Blue Tang surgeonfish swimming near some seafan corals which was SO cool! This was my first sighting of my reef taxon. My phone camera did not cooperate, so all of my surgeonfish pictures that I had attempted turned out super blurry, which was disappointing. However, Claire D had borrowed a dive camera from Dr. Evans and got a cool picture of them! I do not have the access to those images, but they are somewhere in Dr. Evans’ possession…

On the way back to the boat, I almost ran into fire corals due to the congregation of corals in a shallow area and the high traffic of all of the TFB’s heading back the boat all at once. After getting back on the boat, I started to feel nauseated again feeling the rockiness of the boat as well as the smell of motor oil.

Lily was not feeling great as well, so we switched partners to be Lily & I and Elise & Ian. We sat on the boat for a while, but the coast guard advised us to get off as being stationary on the boat will make our nausea worse. As we got out, we mainly stayed on our shallow reefs, but our efforts were mainly focused on keeping ourselves contained, as Dr. Evans informed us that once you start throwing up, you will not stop until you get back on land. I felt slightly better than before, but with the natural rockiness of the currents, the nausea persisted.

Although the day didn’t proceed 100 % as anticipated, it was surreal to see all of the coral reef ecosystem spread out in front of my very own eyes. Even in the second session where i was not actively snorkeling, I was mesmerized by the sheer beauty of the scenery. I was encapsulated by the different shades of blues coming together, such as turquoise and deep blue. There was no land on sight, minus the couple islands nearby our snorkel zone.

I really hope this night’s sleep will nurse me back to health and that I would be able to participate to my fullest tomorrow.

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Day 9: Travel to Glovers Reef

May 30, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi Blog,

This morning, we had breakfast at the Tropical Education Center and promptly left at 9 AM. We had about an hour bus ride to Belize City, where we stopped at a store, had lunch, bought some souvenirs, and waited until our boat came at 1 PM. On our way, I saw the vegetation change from rainforest to savannah, which was cool. For lunch, a couple of us split two margarita pizzas while Elise & I split an Island Sunrise smoothie. We asked for an extra cup but sadly, it was $1 USD and I did not have cash on me. The food court area was a part of a resort and had a gift shop attached to it. For my friends, I bought four magnets representing Belize which I thought were pretty cool & cute, while I bought a beach skirt (which can be tripled as a dress & a cover up) for myself. At around 1 PM, we all headed out from the food court into the dock, where the boat was waiting for us.

The boat ride was spectacular. There were no seats left at the edges of the boats, so I sat in the middle; nevertheless, the view was amazing. We saw the water change colors from murky brown to green to turquoise to deep blue, then back to turquoise. The boat ride lasted about 3 hours, and was calm for 1 hour, until we transitioned into the deep blue waters where the currents became stronger and the boat essentially turned into a rollercoaster ride. At this point, I started to get a little seasick, so I tried my best to keep my eyes on the horiozon. Soon enough we reached Glover’s Reef, where the water was mainly turquoise. I could not belize (haha!) that this stunning place was where we were going to be staying for the next 5 days.

As soon as we got out, we immediately saw nurse sharks in the water as well as a lot of bone fish. I was astonished by how all of the sea life were just hanging out in the water as opposed to the rainforest, where everything seems to be hiding. As we stepped onto the island, we were also greeted by hermit crabs, and some of them were quite huge!!

After settling and putting our stuff down, we went to the dock to sit, lay down, and appreciate the landscape. It was mindblowing to see the surrounding crystal blue waters accompanied by the refreshing sea breeze along with the company of my classmates.

At 8 PM, we had presentations, which everyone did an amazing job at, then we had a session where we went over our dive gear to make sure everything was functioning correctly.

Tomorrow, we will be able to actually get in the water, which I am so stoked about! Since all of our observations were from the dock or on the island, I have yet to spot a surgeonfish with my own eyes, but I am hopeful that I will be able to see some tomorrow!!

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Pre-departure Blog!

May 14, 2025 sk283 Leave a comment

Hi everyone – my name is Sohee Kim and I’m a Biosciences major with an Ecology & Evolutionary Biology concentration! It is currently 2 days before the trip and I am beyond excited. Tomorrow, I’ll be heading to Houston since we need to be in ABL by 6 AM on Friday. This will be my first time traveling to Central America and the tropics, so I am super excited to explore a region I’ve never visited before.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been busy preparing by researching my taxa (Surgeonfishes and Rainforest Mammals) as well as preparing for my presentation topic, which focuses on Visual and Auditory Communication in Rainforest Animals. I’ve read numerous scientific articles and am looking forward to seeing some of these organisms in real life.

I expect that I’ll be able to encounter some of the mammal species at our night tour at the Belize Zoo, which I’m especially excited about as a pre-vet student! There were so so many cool mammal species that I wanted to put on the ID sheet, but I had to cut out so many of them. 🙁 I also expect to gain extensive insight into what it is like to be a tropical field biologist, which may help me further shape my career plans—whether I want to focus solely on clinical veterinary medicine or combine it with research. I have gained ecological research (about phytoplanktons!) experience in a lab setting, but I am super thrilled to experience what it’s like to conduct fieldwork in a completely different setting.

Sneak peak for my rainforest taxon ID sheet!

I’ve also read a couple of student blogs from past years, and apparently the howls of the Mexican Black Howler Monkeys were heard, so hopefully we will have a chance to hear (or see!) them too! I also really want to see one of the cat species out in the wild, but I know that is pretty unlikely.. But miracles can happen — so …maybe! I will update on if my wish was fulfilled in my ending blog entry!

Also, I’ve developed a foundational knowledge based on our required readings and additional scientific articles I have read for my presentations, and I’m excited to build on that foundation by visiting the actual historical sites and ecosystems we’ve been reading about. Throughout this trip, I hope to strengthen my observational skills and gain extensive hands-on experience in species identification, fieldwork, and collaboration with classmates in completely new ecosystems!

I’m a little nervous about the inevitable, countless mosquito and bug bites to be obtained throughout the trip, but hopefully my hydrocortisone cream can help with that.. I don’t really have experience with fieldwork other than BIOS 213 (Intro Lab to Ecology/Evolutionary Biology), so I’m really excited for these next two weeks to gain some insight to what it’s like to be a tropical field biologist!

Next blog post, I will actually be in Belize, which is un-belizeable!

Well then, I will see you all in Belize!! 😉

With love,

Sohee

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Herbivorous Fish Everywhere!

June 1, 2019 pjk4 Leave a comment

May 24^th, 2019

Today we embarked on a lengthier project, measuring percent live coral cover in marine protected area reefs vs. reefs outside of them. After breakfast and a boat safety talk, we climbed into a whaler and travelled to our protected area reef. The weather was perfect for snorkeling, barely any wind and cloudy due to approaching rain.

Jumping into the water and swimming to the sandy center of the reef (where our groups met up), I already saw so many colorful corals with different little wrasses darting amongst them. I reeled out my groups transect line, swimming though different sea fans (a soft coral) and over top of the coral heads (careful to avoid the stinging fire coral). Swimming over the corals was just an amazing and surreal experience, seeing all the different colors in the crystal clear was breathtaking. After finishing our quadrats, we got a chance to swim around the reef and explore.

The reef was full of herbivorous fish. There were Blue Tang Surgeonfish, what species Dory is from Finding Nemo with their characteristic blue bodies and yellow caudal spines, munching on some algae that was in the coral. There were also a lot parrotfish swimming in and under the coral heads. A very prevalent species was the colorful Stoplight Parrotfish. Parrotfish are special in that they have two “phases” of coloring and can be hermaphroditic (can change sexes). The initial phase of the stoplight parrotfish has a red orange underbelly and speckled body scale. There were also terminal phase Stoplight Parrotfish, which have a green head and body with yellow scales at the base of the tail and have orange/red scales on their tail. They also have a pink strip near their pectoral fin. In both phases, Stoplight Parrotfish are quite spectacular, and often feed in groups so they are easy to see. I also saw more Ocean Surgeonfish and Three-spotted damselfish. I also saw an adult Dusky Damselfish swimming through the coral, with its brown/black coloration and its rounded, continuous dorsal fin.

After around fifteen minutes of swimming, we loaded onto the boat and went to the unprotected reef and performed the same task. Per usual, we ended the day with lectures.

BIOS 319: Tropical Field Biology

Tag Archives: surgeonfish

The Season Finale: Reflections from Belize

Day 15: Leaving Belize

Day 14: Last Full Day in Belize

Day 13: MPAyyyee & Bonefish!

Day 12: More Parrotfish and Hat Misfortunes

Day 11: Snorkeling and Some Lionfish!

Day 10: Snorkel and Fun

Day 9: Travel to Glovers Reef

Pre-departure Blog!

Herbivorous Fish Everywhere!

Rice University