Planes, a bus, riverboat and 15 hours later we finally made it to Refugio Bartola and the neotropical rainforest along the Rio San Juan, Nicaragua. The amount of abundant wildlife and astonishing biodiversity I\u2019ve encountered in the last three days is almost indescribable. To get a picture, at night time while sloshing along one of the countless muddy trails the ground glistens with the eyes of the largest spiders and unidentifiable insects I\u2019ve ever encountered. Whether it is the chirping red Strawberry Poison Dart frogs, the rambunctious White Faced Capuchin swinging from branch to branch 30m in the air, or the venomous Coral Snake slithering among the leaf litter (I\u2019m wearing calf high boots Mom it\u2019s all good!) I have yet to feel that I\u2019m not actually in a Planet Earth documentary on National Geographic, but actually experiencing the real thing.<\/p>\n
In terms of the research aspect of the trip I\u2019m currently in the beginning stages of developing and working on two projects. My partner (Kathleen) and I are working on an animal behavior study aimed at understanding interspecific competition among ground dwelling spiders, while our conservation study is looking at the effects of distance from edge environments on bird and mammal species richness.<\/p>\n
So far it\u2019s been quite a surreal experience. Having such an incredible opportunity in the rainforest is both a daunting and humbling experience. And maybe, just hopefully, I\u2019ll stop having vivid images of spiders crawling all over me every time I close my eyes in the next couple days.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Planes, a bus, riverboat and 15 hours later we finally made it to Refugio Bartola and the neotropical rainforest along the Rio San Juan, Nicaragua. The amount of abundant wildlife and astonishing biodiversity I\u2019ve encountered in the last three days is almost indescribable. To get a picture, at night time while sloshing along one of … Continue reading Pirates of the Rio San Juan<\/span>