The end is close...

Wow, it's been almost 3 months here in the middle of the jungle, time has just fly by...Now I'm sort of wrapping up everything, having good bye dinners, parties, and so on...

In my last field adventure we took a jeep to go as deep as we could into the jungle using the old pipeline road. We drove almost 10 km until we ran across a tree fall that blocked the road completely. So we left the car there and hiked for about 1 hour looking for butterfly aggregations. We had no luck, no aggregations, although the hike was amazing as usual.

It is really weird how I feel right now. I feel a little bit nostalgic and almost don't want to leave this amazing place but at the same time I feel that for now it's enough and it's time to go back to the "civilization". I've met wonderful people and have had amazing experiences here, they all gained a place in my heart. Although I will leave with excitement because after discovering this place and obtained decent research results I have decided to come back next summer!!!

Adventure in the Pacific ocean

We decided to travel to an island off the pacific coast off Panamá. One of the closest Islands groups is called the Pearl Islands. One of these is called Contadora. Contadora was said to be used by the Spanish conquistadors as a stop for taking inventory of booty prior to returning to Spain, hence the name (contador means counter or bookkeeper in Spanish). So we got our plane tickets in a small airport at the city and we took a small fixed wing plane powered by two propeller engines. The island had no airport just a very short airstrip long enough for these small type of planes. It was really quiet with some buildings for tourists and a few restaurants. Beaches were pretty good, soft almost-white sand and clear bluish water. The view from the beach was also pretty nice because there are small island everywhere.

A few walks around this small Island (1 x 1.3 km) and not a single of my butterflies, I saw just a few species but nothing outstanding.

We were told that humpback whales were overwintering around the islands so we hired a boat man an set an appointment for the next day to depart at 9 AM from a beach that is just next to the airstrip (yes there is a beach just under a 40 meters from the airstrip!!). Well the next morning came and it was raining just like if a hurricane was on top of the island... it rained until noon so of course we could not go in our whale "hunting" expedition. So after lunch we went to the beach to see if there was any boatman willing to take us whale watching and we found one! He said well I can't guarantee anything it's almost a matter of luck if we find them. So we boarded the boat and left. We looked everywhere anxiously but nothing, some old floating trunks far away played games with our search sometimes but nothing. After 20 minutes or so I saw what I though it was two whales that barely touched surface, I saw their backs I said. The boatman quickly turned his head in the direction I was pointing and he said "they are there". He put full throttle in that direction so we got to the area and slowed down and started to wait. Suddenly we saw one about 100 meters from us, it was huge!! So we got closer and all of sudden they all started to show up to take some air. The column of water they spray when they breathe is stunning I had no words to express my excitement. They were always about 5-10 meters from the boat. They disappeared again and suddenly a huge one emerged just ahead of the boat! We had it at less than 1 meter and our boat was small, it was just amazing... We took pictures until we got tired, hahaha and then we headed back to shore.

On our way back to Panama we took a slightly bigger plane but the best part of the flight was the landing. It was just perfect the pilot approached the airstrip slowly and we barely felt the contact with the ground. Forgive me for this random paragraph but I'm amazed by planes and I will learn to fly them soon!

The Gallery

Where did the rain go???

For some weird reason it has not rained in more than 2 weeks!!! Some people say this is because the hurricanes are sucking all the humidity but who knows... This just makes days and nights a lot dryer and warmer which is not very comfortable. But most importantly this weather is definitively not good for the butterflies. The drought probably hit the local populations and growth rates of the host plants, so few butterflies can make it. In other words no water, no food, no life... Several of my roosting aggregations have been severely hit and the numbers have decreased drastically. So now I'm in a sort of exploratory mission to see if I can find good numerous aggregations...although I don't thing will improve until we get more rain... well that's the field!

Again I introduce you to a really neat spot for research around here! It's called Barro Colorado Island (red mud island), or as I have decided to call it "Buena Compañía Island"... I heard from some professors that there were butterfly aggregations there. In fact it would not surprise me because in my previous exploratory trips I've seen my butterflies flying around. So my mission this time was to find roosting aggregations at BCI.

In order to find the aggregations you need a good blend of luck, patience, and good sight, -and other secret ingredients, hahaha-. There is a small window of time when the aggregations can be found, it's about an hour and a half before sunset. At this time the butterflies start gathering in pre-roosting spots, where they meet with each other before going to their actual roosting spot. After walking for about an hour through the suggested areas I was sort of disappointed, nothing, not even a single butterfly...
However, I remembered that when I left my room I saw a butterfly flying around just a few meters from the building but I said to myself "I'll come back later to check it out". Well, after my search I came back to this spot and yes there were two butterflies fluttering around! so one of them left and I followed her for about 15 minutes, and then she went into some sort of dense bushy vegetation patch and I lost it..damn! So I came back to the original spot and the other one was still there, I said "well let's follow this one". I followed it to the same patch were I lost the first one and guess what? I lost it too!!!

But I was determined and knew that the aggregation had to be really close. So I started to explore around this patch and a few minutes later I found it! There were just two butterflies and they were roosting gregariously! So this finding is definitively good since I can always come back to check if the numbers have increased and eventually perform some experiments!

Well, I will post new pics soon in the Gallery, so check it out!!

Mangostine tree

Last weekend I decided to go on a hike. My original plan was going to pipeline road (a road that goes through the jungle that is only used for research), bring my net, and just enjoy nature. But when I left the house I changed my mind and went to a completely different and unknown place.

The only way to get to Gamboa is through a very small bridge -300m long- that only has one lane. It's sort of scary going in a car through it because it's not an actual paved lane, it's just two-80cm paved sections that go just under the car tires. There is a stop light in each side of the bridge to control the car flow direction. The bridge also has a railroad section and some space for pedestrians just next to the car lane (I'll post pics later). I walked to the bridge and started walking through it, the bridge passes where the Chagres river and the lake Gatun mix their waters. There is some nice breeze coming all the time. My target this time was to find a mangostine tree (mangostino in spanish). I've tried this fruit before in Colombia, and in my opinion, it probably has one of the most exquisite flavors among tropical and temperate fruits. Somebody told me that the tree was just next to the bridge, although I had absolutely no idea how it was going to look like. I scanned a few trees I saw with no luck, no fruits, or old fruits on the ground. Just past the bridge to the left, there was this beautiful tree, with intense green and dense foliage. It had no flowers or fruits, and it was located just at the edge of the Chagres river. I started searching the ground, and there they were, mangostines! The fruits I found were old and dry, but now I know were I can get these amazing fruits! I just hope the tree gives some fruits before I leave this place.

Getting used to life in the Jungle

Well, it's been a month living in a magical place in the middle of the Jungle. Unlike my first days here, now time is passing so fast and I just want every second to last forever here...

I can't complain at all, the first days were a little bit rough, but once I moved to my current apartment things started getting better and better. I'm living in a house owned by a Danish-American couple. Many people from here say that it's probably the best place to live in Gamboa. The place is nice, my room is big, and decorated tastefully with local and foreign native indian crafts. The kitchen has whatever I need to cook the most complex recipes, -although I haven't been able to cook anything-, we have hot water, satellite tv, and internet access. It's weird to have this little bubble of civilization in the middle of the rain forest. The husband is called Ani, he is an old man full of amazing stories. We sometimes sit after lunch and talk a little bit. One afternoon he told me that he was taken as a war prisoner by the Japanese army by mistake. He was just a tall 13 year-old boy wandering around the woods in Indonesia -were he was raised- and the Japs thought he was an American soldier. They kept him during 3 years and was treated just like any other prisoner, "I had to grow up really fast", he said when telling me the story, "Life has been so kind to me, I'm really lucky" I thought...

Well, not many animals this time, jajaja

The island

This weekend I decided to go and explore a natural sanctuary which is an island in the canal. The island has a field station as well and there are boats that take you there. We took the 8 AM boat on Saturday the ride was easy and smooth and was just 30 minutes. We got there eat a couple of bananas and started our hike. We saw howler monkeys almost instantly, the population of these monkeys seems to be more used to humans and also might be denser than in Gamboa, since the place is protected from poachers. We walked to famous spot called "big tree" I saw a few big ceibas (huge jungle trees) but when we arrived to the spot it was obvious, we were in front of a huuuuuge ceiba, -thicker than the red woods I saw in California earlier this year-. I estimate the tree was about 6 meters width. While contemplating this magnificent tree we saw a big yellow-greenish thing climbing the tree, but it was too high so it was impossible to catch. I said to myself "I hope is falls down so we can see what is it" and luckily the bug fall down. We quickly realized it was an insect and grabbed it! it was about 4 inches long and 2 inches wide. I immediately recognized it, it was a buprestid. It had beautifull elytra (wing covers) covered in a yellow-green iridiscent dust and underneath it was iridescent metallic purple.

After lunch we decided to take a couple of kayaks to explore the island. We were told that there was a lot of crocodriles around, and in fact several people told us they had seen a couple of them near the dock just earlier in the morning. The kayaks were quite small and I honestly didn't feel very safe on them, also we did not have life vests. We didn't go to far but we saw beautiful landscapes and a couple of predatory birds. Since the island is just off the canal main "lane" used by the huge cargo ships we had the opportunity to litterally sail side by side with one of these huuge ships. They sail very quiet and smoothly and don't generate waves. One of this monsters passed by and we were at about 150 meter from it totally amazed!

At night we went on a hike looking for snakes and frogs. We found some really interesting frogs and one non-poisonus snake.

Today in the morning we went on a hike looking for the famous dart frogs that are used by natives in their darts to hunt. We found a small stream and start walking through it uphill,(These little frogs loved this type of wet places). It did not take too long until we found the first one, beautiful little frog all black with green spots all over, just beautiful. We handled it to take some pictures and then we released it and washed our hands to remove the neuro-toxin impregnated in our hands.

Weekend is over...

Silent Walker

Yesterday we went looking for butterflies aggregations around the actual Gamboa town. We peeked into backyards and asked around if anyone had seen before the nocturnal aggregations. People was quite friendly but no one had seen the aggregations at dusk. We walked all the way till the end of a no-exit street and start searching near a shrub line. When searching we saw a small trail so I said, let's see if get lucky. The trail actually brought us into a big rain forest patch. It was almost magic, like a door to the forest. On our walk I saw a person ahead of us, it was an indian. He had no shoes and he made almost no sound when walking. We approached him to say hi, he said "hi my name is Smith". His spanish was very basic. I asked him what was his tribe and he said he was a "Chocoi". Then he grabbed his bag and said do you want to buy some handcrafts? I said sure show me what you have. He had a mask and a little base, both were pretty cool! and actually they were like 4-5 times cheaper than in any market I've been to here in Panama. Then I realized I just had 2 dollars in my wallet, hahaha -I would have never imagined me buying from an indian in the middle of the jungle-. So I told him lets met tomorrow at the beginning of the trail and I will buy you some handcrafts. After our coversation we continued walking and we saw the butterflies, yes! we found another aggregation!

Observation tower

On Friday we went to a new spot looking for more butterflies. We explore the area near the hotel. On our way we realized there was an observation tower! We started then going uphill in a really steep hike towards the observation tower. Once we got there, the cool thing was that as we went up in the observation tower we saw different butterfly species -different butterflies have different height flying ranges-. The view was spectacular -see the gallery-. On our way back, we saw a really cool animal, -what I call the raccoon of the jungle-. It's like a raccoon but the head shape is long, like an ant eater I would say. They are pretty nice and -as raccoons- like to scavenge. Well, it's the weekend! most of the researchers here work on Saturdays and Sundays, but hey!! not me!! it's a shame not to enjoy with friends and locals, and rest after a week of pretty hard work!

I met a black friend!

Well yesterday was a surprisingly dry day. We didn't have much luck in the morning collecting butterflies but we were successful getting coconuts to make risotto for dinner!

In the evening we went to a new spot looking for the butterfly aggregations. This new spot was actually pretty close. It was a small creek with a bunch of flowers called "hot lips" or "labios de puta" (hooker lips) -I know is not the direct translation but that's the way they call those flowers here, hahaha-. I was not paying attention to what was in front of me because I was looking for the butterflies but all of a sudden I saw a big dark thing just in front of me. It was a black caiman!! I was completely frozen at the beginning, man I almost step on a 1.5 meter black caiman -I thought-, My first impulse was to run away but the caiman was apparently so quiet that I slowly stepped back I just took my sight off the caiman for a second and when I looked back again it was gone...

By the end of the evening we found a new butterfly aggregation, so it was a good day afterall!

Well got a go to catch more butterflies, Chao!

Gamboa, Panama

My first days in Gamboa

Well the town where I'm stationed is called Gamboa. It's located next to the canal and surrounded by another river (rio chagres). It's a pretty remote area with no stores, eventually a lady comes to a small shack and sells lunch for 2.50!!. The house where I'm staying is pretty basic, no phone, no cable, no internet, no drier. Clothes here never get dry, specially now because it's the rainy season. I usually go in the morning to the forest to get some mangos for breakfast and there is a little store where they sell me beer and other basic stuff.

Some foreign people have bought property here and there is a couple of really nice houses. They all have boats and fancy range rovers, so I'm pretty sure they go fishing and stuff. Apparently the locals are just realizing the potential and prices are going up super fast. I don't know exactly how expensive but I heard last night that you could buy a house for 100K or 200K and remodel or rebuild it. The town is controlled by some branch of the goverment-canal. I've seen several houses that looked abandoned... The place is super quiet, you only hear the birds. And if you need groceries or other stuff the city is just an hour from the town. Many people here have cars but there is also a bus that only charge 65 cents to go to panama city. I will post pics soon, I'll let you know when they are ready. Gas is a bit more expensive than in the states, but the rest of the stuff is cheap. I went to the city today to buy some stuff and I got two shorts and two shirts for 15 bucks!



Field work

We are doing 4-5 hour walks in the evening every day searching for the butterfly nocturnal aggregations. So far we have found 2, but yesterday one of them was gone.. go knows what happened with that one. My field assistant is pretty white and a little bit stubborn hahahah, he does not like to wear long sleeve shirts so he gets bitten a lot by mosquitoes, besides mosquitos overall seem to like his blood better than mine so that's good because they don't bite me, hahahaha. Anyway yesterday we were walking and I saw a quick moving animal, it was may be a little bit bigger than bunny. It was a small rodent called agutí, they look like a small capibara but with red ears. We also saw howler monkeys, they start making defensive noises when one gets closer to their range but when they realize we are harmless they stop. The night before yesterday night on our way back it started raining really hard, the flashlights had no penetration at all so we were pretty much guided by the GPS, my UF poncho sucks, jajaja, I didn't realize it was to short so my pants got pretty wet. Next time I go to the city I'll try to buy a larger size but I doubt I can find one because all panamanians are pretty short, well see... Me and my italian roommate are planning to go to the city and buy may be 5 bicycles. Our plan is to rent them here to the other researchers to move around the town, a bike make things a bit easier....