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!!