Santa Rosa (Feb. 17-23)

Santa Rosa took awhile to grow on me. It is a dry forest, and very different from Corcovado. I am biased because I hate the desert, and Santa Rosa reminded me a lot of eastern Oregon, which is high desert. One reason I liked Corcovado so much was that I could be barefoot a lot; our campsite was on lush grass. I also enjoyed having the beach a few meters from my tent. Not so in Santa Rosa. However, Santa Rosa’s heat was dry instead of humid, which allowed clothing to dry in two hours instead of never. Santa Rosa also had a surprising amount of diversity for such a dry place. Of course, it is only dry like that during the dry season, which is January to May. The rest of the time it’s practically a swamp. I felt a lot dirtier in Santa Rosa because of the dust. The biting insects were also much worse. While there were more insects in Corcovado, I only got a few bites, but on Day 2 of Santa Rosa I counted 41 itchy bites total on my legs. I was far from the worst though. Poor Lindsey had to go to the doctor because she had some reaction to all the bug bites. Her legs and feet swelled up and she couldn’t walk due to the pain. The doctor gave her some antibiotics and special lotion, which helped after a few days. She still has some scars, but is fine now.

The first night in Santa Rosa, it seemed like a scary place. We arrived at our campsite in the dark, and before we left the bus, Alan gave us a few warnings: try to pitch your tent in a grassy area instead of an area of packed dirt, because that’s where fire ants are; there are rattlesnakes here, so be aware; there might be frogs in the bathrooms because it’s the dry season and they are trying to stay moist; in the morning, check your shoes for scorpions and spiders before you put your feet in them; wolf spiders and tarantulas are everywhere at night, if you shine your flashlight around you’ll see their eyes glowing; there is a bee nest at the base of the big tree; and there are lots of wasps and cockroaches here too. But don’t freak out right away, Alan concluded, allow yourself ten seconds to admire these critters and then freak out.

Umm ok. There was very little grass, by the way. It’s the dry season. In the unloading melee, I managed to snag one of the three spots containing a few tufts of dried grass and leaves while Rebecca grabbed our tent. We threw all our stuff inside the tent and zipped it quickly to keep the bugs out. Finding the bathroom in the dark was another adventure, as was what we found in the bathroom. Removing the lid on the toilet tank revealed five or six frogs. Sometimes they would migrate to the bowl too. One time, my friend Amber flushed the toilet, and three or four frogs that had been hiding under the lip were flushed down too. Whoops.

 We could also see glowing tarantula eyes wherever we shined flashlights. The eyes looked like twinkling stars on the ground, except attached to a large spider. The tarantulas would scurry out of the way if you came too close. I kept my shoes inside the tent instead of risking them turning into a scorpion home. Luckily, Santa Rosa was much less scary in the daylight.

The first morning in Santa Rosa, I awoke to lots of new bird calls. I had become familiar with the bird calls in Corcovado, so it was disorienting to hear so many different ones. There were also way more species than I expected in such a dry place. During breakfast, someone spotted an anteater in a tree.

Northern Tamandua Anteater

Like the research project in Corcovado, we did a similar group project in Santa Rosa. There are these small trees called Acacias that have an obligate mutualism with a genus of ants. The tree has hollow thorns to house the ants and provides extra nectar for the ants to eat. The ants attack anything that disturbs their home, like herbivores, in a stinging swarm. Without the ants, the tree dies quickly from too much herbivory, and the ants can't live anywhere else: obligate mutualism. There are other animals that take advantage of the ants' protection, such as birds. Some wrens and flycatchers build their nests in ant Acacias to protect their young from predators. They build the nest slowly to allow the ants to get used to it by walking on it and thus scent marking the nest as part of their home. There are three species of Pseudomrymex ants that inhabit these Acacias, and they have varying levels of aggression. My group investigated whether wrens and/or flycatchers prefer Acacias with a certain species of ant. We predicted the birds might prefer to nest in trees with the most aggressive ants because those would provide the most protection from predators. We walked around looking for wren and flycatcher nests, then noted which species of ant lived in the tree. Several hours and lots of analysis later, our data showed that the birds don't have a preference, which means they might be basing their nest selection on some other criteria.

ant Acacia

wren nest in an Acacia

analyzing our data

Other highlights of this trip were:

Another long hike to a beach, similar to that in Corcovado. At the beach, we saw a sea turtle digging her nest and laying eggs. We also helped a baby turtle reach the ocean.

the hike 

Squirt, the baby sea turtle we helped to the ocean

Momma sea turtle laying eggs

Momma sea turtle covering her nest

turtle tracks

Also in Santa Rosa, we had Mammal Diversity Day, where we learned a lot about mammals, including a lecture by the well-known bat biologist Richard LaVal. Appropriately, there were lots of white-faced capuchin monkeys in camp that day. That night, we set up mist nests (really fine nets used to catch bats and birds) to catch some bats for a close-up look. In addition to bats, we also found a cute wooly opossum in a tree.

Richard LaVal with a bat

White-faced capuchin

checking out a bat we caught at night in the mist net

this bat has such large ears for good hearing and echolocating at night

Wooly Opossum

On our last day in Santa Rosa, we took a day trip to Rincón de la Vieja (Old woman's corner), a national park containing Volcán Rincón de la Vieja, an active volcano. Our professors pointed out the cool trails and designated a time to meet back at the bus, then set us loose to explore. I hiked to some bubbling mud pits and steam vents with Rebecca and Tim.

Rincón de la Vieja park 

Tim, Rebecca, and I hiking

thar be some volcanic activity in them yonder hills!

volcanic mud pit

bubbly

Then, I explored on my own a bit. I wanted to go slow and look for birds. I saw a rare Yellow-eared Toucanet and a Northern Barred Woodcreeper. I also saw my first manakins and a Blue-crowned Motmot! They were Long-tailed Manakins, and they were lekking!!! A lek is an animal courtship display consisting of several males trying to impress one or more watching females. The males dance, make noise, and generally try to look sexy in a highly visible area called a lek arena. This can be anything from the top of tree branches to a wide open dirt patch, such as in the case of Sooty Grouse. Most species of manakin lek by flying rapidly from tree to tree, "dancing" on branches, and making crazy noises by beating their wing tips together 100 times per second (see an awesome video here). This is apparently hot stuff to female manakins. The male Long-tailed Manakins I saw were hopping around the tree canopy making clicking noises while a few females flitted around the outskirts.

male Long-tailed Manakins

The Blue-crowned Motmot was another great find, though I only glimpsed it for a few seconds. My elation was dashed, however, by what I saw soon afterwards. I was craning my neck up, trying to see where the motmot had gone, when I heard lots of rustling in the leaves near my feet. I glanced down and noticed lots of grasshoppers jumping, beetles scurrying, moths fluttering, and spiders scuttling around me, all headed in one direction. I wasn't sure what to make of it, but didn't feel endangered, so I continued peering through my binoculars. A few seconds later, when the rustling of arthropods became louder instead of subsiding, I looked down again. This time, I saw a swarm of army ants in hot pursuit of the tasty, escaping minifauna about a meter from where I stood. I had no idea whether army ants attacked humans, but did not want to stick around to find out. I learned later that army ants (Eciton burchellii) are pretty much blind and so only bite moving organisms. You could theoretically stand barefoot and motionless in a swarm of army ants and be perfectly fine. I think I'll wear boots if I decide to do that though. Read a cool article about army ants here.

After meeting up with the rest of the group, we boarded the bus and traveled to a beautiful beach to enjoy the sunset, each other, and some cold Imperial. We had a delicious dinner at a restaurant on the way back to camp, then stayed up late singing along to Charlie's guitar and Isa's ukulele. A perfect last night in the dry forest. And then, finally on to Monteverde the next day!

obligatory jumping silhouette sunset photo

the whole group

Traveling (Feb. 16th and 17th)

The 16th was a travel day: boats from Corcovado to Sierpe, then a bus from Sierpe to a nice hotel at Playa Hermosa. The most exciting part of the day was waiting for two hours in Sierpe because our bus had fallen into a ditch on its way to pick us up. When the bus finally made it, there were several large dents in the side and near the taillights, and one of the bottom compartment doors had to be tied on. Luckily, we made it to Playa Hermosa with no further incident, in time for a gorgeous sunset.

The hotel showers were cold but clean, though even my semi-clean clothes felt pretty dirty afterwards. We had a tasty dinner at a seafood place nearby, where most tables ordered the grande seafood plate.

I did some laundry in the hotel room sink (yay clean underwear), and then enjoyed a great night’s sleep in a soft bed.

The 17th was another travel day, thought we stopped in two places before reaching our final destination: a campsite in Santa Rosa National Park, where we stayed for the rest of the field trip.

The first stop was Carara, another national park, where we walked around with lots of foreign tourists and did species reports on several plants and animals. A cool park, but not the most interesting way to spend the time, and I was really hungry the whole time. Lunch was exactly what I wanted though: pizza! And soda and salad. So good after a week of rice and beans. The ctenosaurs wanted some too.

walking around Carara

We also walked over a bridge, where a bunch of crocodiles hang out in the river below.

After another bus ride nap, we arrived in Liberia, a town with internet cafes and supermarkets. We stopped here for only an hour so we could contact home and buy anything lacking, lost, or broken from the first half of the field trip. I bought ice cream, some cheap sunglasses to replace the pair that is now somewhere in the Pacific, a bigger memory card for my camera, and a few minutes of internet to check my email and let my parents know I was still alive.

YES. I needed multi-colored hair gel.

back on the bus

The rest of Corcovado (Feb. 14-15)

The next day (Valentine’s Day!), we took boats to Caño Island to learn about island ecology and go snorkeling. Along the way, a pod of pantropical spotted dolphins crossed our path. There were about 15 dolphins swimming around and coming up for air 2-3 meters from the boat. One even jumped out of the water; very cool.

the Isla!

We had class on the beach, with Alan using the sand as a chalkboard to demonstrate island biogeography theory. We also hiked around the island a little and did some species reports.

Snorkeling was very fun. I got a little seasick sitting in the rocking boat adjusting my snorkel mask, but once I got in the warm water I felt fine. There were lots of pretty fish, and I even saw a green sea turtle and a white-tipped reef shark. Back on the boats, we saw more dolphins and I learned that my missing bag was on one of the boats. I was very happy to have my bag back. As soon as we returned to camp, I brushed my hair, brushed my teeth, and used deodorant for the first time in four days. I also set up my clean and comfortable sleeping bag and pad in the tent.

After dinner and a lecture, our professors took us on one of the coolest things I’ve ever done: a night hike through the rainforest. Part of the way we hiked on the path, keeping quiet and listening to the night sounds and stopping often to check out some amazing insects, spiders, lizards, and frogs. The other part of the hike was through the creek, stepping carefully through knee-deep water, our headlamps reflecting on the surface. Large orthopterans (grasshoppers, crickets, and katydids) with crazy long antennae blended into the leaves until our movements disturbed them into jumping away. Huge spiders and tarantulas waited for prey under leaves and logs. Sleeping Norops lizards stretched out on thin branches overhead, trying to hide from their vine snake predators. We found a few yellow leaf frogs, which were smaller than the spiders we were seeing. One of the coolest finds was a cane toad sitting by its burrow under a log. Native here, they are huge pests where they were introduced in Australia. The other cool find was a caiman, which is like a small crocodile, swimming in the creek. We followed it upstream for a ways before it hid.

through the creek

through the creek

yellow leaf frog

katydid

cane toad

Feb. 15

Our last day in Corcovado, we had a morning lecture on beach ecology, appropriately barefoot and sitting on the beach. Class was interrupted twice; once when someone discovered tapir tracks nearby and the other when we watched humpback whales spouting and diving several hundred meters off the coast.

tapir tracks

After lunch, we had a scavenger hunt. My partner, Shelley, and I finished early, so we went to the swimming hole with a few other people. After sweating in the humidity all day, the creek was so refreshing. It was the perfect temperature sitting on rocks in the shade by the creek, and we had a view of the ocean and the sunset. While we were chatting, a white-faced capuchin monkey jumped into a tree right overhead. Then, we noticed some howler monkeys munching on leaves in a different tree. Soon after that, some spider monkeys swung by and some scarlet macaws flew overhead. We marveled at this amazing place, and considered what we would be doing if we were at our home universities right now: definitely something much less remarkable, like studying in a dorm room. This was one of my favorite moments from the trip.

sweet spider on the path to the swimming hole

view from the swimming hole