Intruder alert, intruder alert

Number of Ticks Removed: 53
Days Tick Free: 0

Well, Rob got to where he was going without any major troubles, I guess. Before his bus left on Friday morning, I saw them fill it up with gas, which answers my question of how they actually do that here. There's not a gas station on this side of the island, so I am glad someone had the foresight to realize they needed fuel to make it to Moyogalpa. I was also glad to see that Rob had some friendly company on the bus. Clara, the woman who lives/works next door at the vegetable stand, was on the bus with her kids (or maybe niece and nephew?) Every evening as I walk by their place on my way home from the forest, Clara tells the kids to wave at me and say "Hola, Melissa." Cute. Here's a picture of the kids spontaneously starting to dance when somebody cranked up the music before the bus took off.


Rob ready to go



I've been working pretty hard since Rob left, but unfortunately don't have much to show for it. There are no juveniles of the right age for me to study in the North group, which certainly makes it difficult to get data on that age class. There are two older juveniles (Horace and Jess) who are already weaned, but I’ve had trouble finding them recently. On Saturday, I couldn’t find them at all, so I followed Wrinkle Belly. The day was a good one for Wrinkle Belly because he got lucky with a female twice, plus he ate tender young ficus leaves for his afternoon snack. What made the day most noteworthy, however, was that I saw a baby coral snake. So poisonous, but so beautiful. Out of the corner of my eye, I just happened to catch a brilliant flash of red, black, and yellow. It was moving so fast that I couldn’t really tell what the order of the stripes were (Red next to black, friend of Jack…), so it is possible that it may not have had that deadly red/yellow combination and was instead a mimic species. I guess we will never know!

Sunday I set out, determined to find a North group juvenile, but was unlucky yet again. It was actually a pretty wretched day. With all the rain we’ve been having, the canopy has become so dense that it is sometimes almost impossible to see anything. Picture a house with green ceilings. Now imagine that you are trying to look up through the ceiling to observe monkeys on the roof. That is what it is like. Thus, I have been having a lot of trouble staying with my focal animal and actually seeing what he/she is doing. I had thought with the rains that tick season would be over, but not so. On Sunday I removed 7, count them 7 ticks. I swear, Nicaraguan insects actually like bug repellent instead of being deterred by it.

For the second day in a row, the North group was squarely in the South group’s home range, and I really began to wonder—if the North group is in the South group’s range, then where is the South group? That brings us to today, when I resolved that come hell or high water, I would find a North juvenile. Mercifully, I encountered Jess after about a half an hour of wandering the ranks of the North group. She was foraging with her mother and a male I call Medio. As the morning progressed, I heard a bunch of howling not too far away. It quickly became apparent that the South group was close by and not happy that the North group had intruded into their range. All of a sudden, Uno (of the South group) charged from out of nowhere and chased Medio out of his tree and almost down to the ground. I was so close to the action that I actually had to dart out of the way because I thought Medio was going to fall on top of me. The other monkeys fled the confrontation as quickly as they could. Poor Medio clung to a spindly Cecropia trunk, barely 3 feet off the ground. It was clear that he was frightened: his breathing was so heavy that I could see his sides heaving. There were no other trees nearby for him to scramble up into, and he seemed too scared to actually walk on the ground. Uno stayed in the tree crown, directly above him, and Medio had nowhere to go. I stayed there watching them; at one point Medio looked at me, directly into my eyes, and I swear he had this sad little expression on his face like, “Please help me, lady.” Believe me, I would have if I could have, but in the end, I just backed away slowly to give him room to do whatever he needed to do.

In all the commotion, I must have gotten Jess mixed up with a like-aged female juvenile from the South group. It took me about an hour and a half to realize that I had somehow switched to the South group and the North group had retreated down the camino. It was another hour before I found Jess again amid the North group. I managed to stay with her for about 5 more hours before then dense canopy intervened and I lost her for good. So after these last several days, I’m feeling exhausted and defeated and like the next two months are going to be incredibly frustrating. I’ve made it to the point at which the sun begins to rise later, but it really doesn’t seem like there’s been any change. Thankfully I collected a plant sample this afternoon, so I am going to stay in from the forest tomorrow and test it. Hopefully after a day to recover, I can re-energize and actually get some meaningful data when I go back out to the forest.

Its been a long day, so I need to sign off before I fall asleep at the computer. Thanks for reading!