May 24

Hi! I’ve had a busy past few days! Last Tuesday (the 16^th) we went into Panama City for the Tupper talk. The talk was on mathematical modeling of tree growth and mortality and can you make an equation to predict such growth. It was a whole load of mathematical, er, uh, modeling, that made little to no sense to me, and seemed to not produce an answer at all. I didn’t really get the point…. Afterwards we went back to Rachel’s to make a curry for a whole assortment of people, and to partake in some wine. There’s a nice little community European and American biologists here. Dinner was a great time! J

The best part was the boat ride back. Boats normally run during the daytime only, but on Tuesdays (because of the talk), or also if it is pre-arranged, there is a late boat. This means you go in the “rescue” boat, a smallish speedboat, with no roof. We whip along as fast as tolerable down the dark canal. The shipping lane is lighted with bright green bouys that stretch way out in front of you. There are still (small) ships passing at night, and we cruise right past them. Arriving at the island is fun, the buildings and radio towers make a yellow glow set back in the bay against nothing but dark forest. The trip this way takes 20 minutes! I’ve now taken the late boat two more times. Both of which were nights with lots of sheet lightning, that lit up the canal and occasionally a passing barge, Tonight we took a very small boat, literally a Boston Whaler size. Our driver mis-judged the wake from a barge, and we all got drenched!

That evening I stayed up past 3am helping the Dutch girls peel and scrape clean black palm seeds; they are conducting an experiment to see if the agouti’s prefer the seeds with or without the flesh. Turns out they like them seed only! The unfortunate part is these fruit are unbelievably stinky, were covered with fruit flies, and stain your fingers and nails orange. Science can be an unbelievably tedious endeavor!

The next morning I had to get up very early to meet the Korean film crew coming off the morning boat. These guys, who spoke very little English, had been on the island all the week before filming for a Korean natural history show. Everyone was incredibly frustrated with them because all the wanted to see were mammals (no interest in leaf-cutter ants, or dung beetles, or butterflies or anything cool!), and they expected that the researchers could make said mammals do interesting things. Hmmm… Sounds very familiar... I guess when the general public is used to only seeing animals on TV documentaries, that’s what they’ve come to expect. Well, everyone was glad to see them go, but then they decided they wanted to film tent-making bats. There are 4 species on the island of bats that make temporary tents by biting along the midline of big fat leaves and then roosting inside. It’s really pretty cool. Well, the Koreans approached Rachel, who told them I’d do it, if they paid me and someone else $100 each. They bargained down to $75, but then there was no one else around, so it looked like I was getting the full $150!

So, I became an expert on tent making bats, and had spent a couple hours in the forest the day before finding some tents. The Koreans were very friendly, though the first thing they said to me was “Take a piss??” which I originally misunderstood as them asking if they needed a pass to be on the island. The filming went really well, the bats did extremely well with being molested, to a point…. At one point they flew off, and very quickly found new tents. I was interviewed, and despite my best efforts to explain reality, I’m sure I’ll be portrayed (if me and the bats make it in the final cut) as a bat expert. They lost interest in the bats to film and agouti, while I desperately tried to find out what plant the bats were roosting in (Calathea!). They mentioned to one of the STRI personnel that they were going to pay me $150, and she very quickly put a stop to that. She said they had to pay STRI $140, and I would get a $55 guide fee. What??!! Such red tape here! The film guys felt bad and gave me a fancily wrapped pen set. J

That weekend we went off to the beach. We went to Santa Clara on the Pacific coast, which isn’t much more than two restaurants that have a few cabins. It was really nice and relaxing, but 18 hours was definitely plenty for all of us! Loads of frigate birds, pelicans, and vulture though. There’s an island off shore where they roost; on a previous trip there, Rachel hired a fisherman to take them out there to see them up close, but we couldn’t manage to convince anyone. We also went over the Bridge of the Americas there and back, very exciting!

Let’s see, other interesting wildlife I’ve seen: spider monkey’s on the lab roof with a stolen bag of microwave popcorn (empty bag, they were licking the fake butter), pairs of amazon parrots (very noisy!), a blue crowned mot-mot (who has two fantastic long tail feathers with big “pendulums” at the end), toucans (who have a rather irritating call), a tiger heron, greater ani playing with baby iguanas, incredible moths, and spiders with bright sparkly eye shine everywhere at night!

I’m working on a little research project. Trachops are traditionally known as “gleaners” meaning they snatch prey off of surfaces, but Rachel has seen them catch insects aerially, and things they should be considered “flexible feeders”. I’m hopefully going to document this by tossing them some katydid’s and recording how many they catch in the air! Day two tonight and so far so good!

I move to Gamboa on Thursday! I also am heading off into the highlands that day with Laura and Kelly, the Dutch girls, and Sara, who is Panamanian although a PhD student in London. I’ll write back with more updates!

J

Miranda