The Mesocosm

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bromeliadThe search continues! We are searching high (literally) and low for more bromeliad invertebrates to finish off our experiments. One week to go until I add the remainder of my communities and then 2 week until I find out if any of this actually worked! Jana is at the same point and would like me to ask if anyone has any larvae of Dytiscid beetles lying around? She still needs for and we think maybe they’re on to us and have all jumped ship!Lisa and Helen are absolute life savers – staring into trays of sludge from dawn until dusk helping us find what we need! Jana and I don’t know what we would do without them!Tomorrow is the start of a bit of a break from science – we’re heading to Santa Rosa station for a night and then trekking the 12 km to the beach at Naranjo. Lots of people, cafeteria, remote beach, and sweltering heat… here we come!
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Pumpkin party!

Here are some pictures from the Srivastava lab pumpkin carving extravaganza! We spent the entire day carving and creating this trophic pyramid, and took away the prize for “best biology”.

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Stand back, I’m going to try science!

Not only is the Costa Rican life pretty sweet – work actually gets done too!  My two experiements (Leaf packs to measure decomposition rate, and communities to measure effects of diversity on predation and decomposition) are all up and running! I’ve claimed nearly every bromeliad within a 1 km radius of the station to stick experiments in.  Now back to searching for more critters so I can replenish things in 2 weeks. 

I was going to include a picture of my experiment, but it actually looks identical to the header photo of this blog! A common site here at Pitilla – bromeliads with plastic tubes with mesh hats sticking out of them. Field ecology is weird.

ALSO – I’m very curious about what is happening back in Vancouver! Have Jana and I suddenly become the sole members of the Srivastava lab?? Where are the posts from home?

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THE RAIN IS HERE!!

Just a quick note to say that it is now actually the rainy season!  We’ve had a couple of good nights of rain and the bromeliads are less bone-dry!  Woo!  Unfortunately that now means working in the rain some of the time but it’s worth it to actually have the critters live!

Speaking of critters – we’re gearing up to put our experimental communities together in the next couple of days. Today was a final push to find the damselfly larvae we need and we found 36 in one day! Woo!

And as a final note – I found the cutest snake you will ever see in a bromeliad today. A little Imantodes sp. (blunt headed snake) that was about 20 cm long and curled up on my hand. His name is leonard. Pictures to follow.

Pura Vida!