Greater spear-nosed batThe largest of the bats we caught in our net. This bat was about the size of a raven. He was really strong and ruined our net.
As three willing and able assistants, we finished our field season with a bang. We captured and studied 23 bats (the record from past years was about 14 bats) and finished all the data entry and analysis for each individual. Our last bat was named El Ultimo .. you may remember from my first blog entry that our very first bat was El Primero, so it seemed fitting to give our last bat a similar name.
Ultimo was quite a character and needed a lot of coaxing and tender loving care before giving us any results! He refused to eat fish for the first few nights forcing us to search for frogs. Thankfully, the rains were beginning to frequent the area and the frogs obliged us by appearing and calling in puddles and ditches.
In the end, Ultimo was a superstar and we were satisfied with all the work that we did with him.
Isla Grande & Portabelo Ruins As a reward for a fantastic field season, Rachel, our supervisor drove us to Isla Grande, a unique, tiny island in the Caribbean Sea. The natives of Isla Grande are decendants of
Parauqui and meOtherwise known as a nightjar, this bird is often heard but rarely seen. We were lucky to catch one in our net and get an up-close look at it. It calls only at night and nests on the ground.
slaves that had been brought to Panama to work on the Canal. They have managed to retain their own culture which appeared very West Indies-like. The food was fantastic and the music was almost tribal. Most of the little girls had finely braided hair decorated with little beads and colored rubberbands and the boys wore board shorts and baggy tee shirts. Their Spanish was extremely difficult to understand.
We arrived in Isla Grande at about 2p.m. and then spent the next two hours looking for a hotel to stay at. The one we were hoping to stay at had no running water and was closed for the week. We finally settled on a dinky motel called Motel Isla Grande which had running water(on the first day), a shower which only managed to drip from time to time and a detached toilet seat which slid off when you sat on it. But we chose this place because of their fantastic stretch of beach.
The water was warm and inviting and the beach was empty (only because it was a weekday) and littered with pretty corals and driftwood.
We swam, ate and slept very happily and found Isla Grande
to be a welcomed change from the hot Gamboan jungle.
On our way back to Gamboa the following day, we stopped by the town of Portabelo to look at the ruins of old Spanish forts and a church which housed a black Jesus Christ. As legend has it, the wooden black Jesus Christ was found floating in the sea nearby and was brought ashore by local fishermen. Being black themselves, they saw it as a sign that God was watching them, that they were not exempt from His mercy. The Jesus Christ statue now sits in a glass case in a large, airy church looking down intensely at His worshippers. I loved the church and had to sit there a while, content to be enveloped in the sound of people whispering their prayers while the pigeons cooed sweetly in their cieling nests overhead.
Farewell and food poisoning I went into town for dinner with my friends Ayesh and Sean. We had a lovely meal in an Italian restaurant which overlooked the Pacific Ocean. All went well, I had a chicken lasagne which was cheesey and hot and I had not eaten much that day so
my tummy was all for the fantastic meal.
But on the way back to Gamboa, I started to feel a little woozie in my tummy, much like I hadn't really digested what I had eaten. I went straight to bed and tossed and turned all night long feeling intensely uncomfortable and big-bellied.
The next morning I woke up, walked into the bathroom and threw up all that I had eaten the night before. It felt great! I took it easy all day. It turns out that Rachel and Katelyn (who had gone for dinner to the island) were also throwing up that morning. I'll never know whether it was that lasagne or if it was a little bug that got all of us. Either way, we traveled to the U.S. the next morning a little sad to leave beautiful Panama, but relieved that we'd all be back home very soon.
I will miss the tropics which always awaken my senses and enliven my spirit.
Next adventure: Southwest Montana and Yellowstone National Park I was unable to re-establish myself at the City of Austin and get full-time work as I had initially hoped. So I applied for
and got a job with the U.S. Forest Service - Northern Region. I'll be spending my summer in beautiful Montana, just a few hours away from Yellowstone National Park. I will be assisting the Forest Service biologists with bat surveys which are conducted in the summer months. I am truly excited about it, but a little scared of the cold (they say it can snow there in July) and of course bears. I am expected to camp in the forest during the surveys and I shudder to think of bears at my camp! I will most probably have another biologist working with me, so maybe they'll be able to shoo off the bear.. or worst case, the bear will be more interested in them..
See you there in a few weeks!
..to complete destructionNorth American and European developers have been ripping the Panamanian highlands apart to make way for large housing developments. Worse still, people from thse countries are paying top dollar to buy
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Macroinvertibrate surveyKatelyn and I helped Amanda Rugenski (sitting in photo) conduct a survey of the macroinvertebrates (insects and crustaceans) in this stream. Amanda is studying the effects of forest destruction on the
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Kick methodI am kicking up the underwater sediment to see how many types of macroinvertebrates we can find. The presence and absence of certain creatures indicates the health of the water ecosystem.
Pretty pollyThis parrot lived outside Amanda's house and awoke early each morning screeching out "hola!" and "Jack! Jack!" Jack was the dog who lived in the complex.
Golden frog almost goneThis beautiful poisonous frog is almost extinct thanks to the developers' clearing out its habitat. It was a key player in the stream ecosystem and its absence may crumble the balance.
Tiny coveI found this patch of sand a long way from the main beach. There was no one else around and it was my picture of paradise. I sat here for hours, watching fish swim in the shallow water and crabs scutt
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Buckets the dogI found that while I walked up and down the beach, I was being followed by a young lab mix. He just wanted to be friends, so I sat with him a while at the cove and he fell asleep as I scratched his he
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Sand-faceBuckets, as Katie named him, stuck his nose into the sand and came up all sandy-nosed and sandy-eyed. I thought he looked very cute.
Enemies in sight!I am sure the Spanish didn't look as goofy, but this is a viewing tower within the fort from where they must have kept vigil.
Bat-bye Panama!This is the whol bat group (from left, top row): Katelyn, myself, Rachel, Antje, Katie, Dina
(bottom row) Christian and Silke. Besides the Katies, myself and Rachel, the others were from different pa
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Panama's Flag
Map of Panama