Recycling in the Rainforest

While hiking in the forest, my friends Jackie and Erika came upon this intact skeleton of an ocelot.  There are so many organisms on BCI that are decomposers that it only takes a few weeks for the remains of a dead animal to be recycled.  Many animals, large and small, benefit from another animal’s demise.  Turkey vultures (very large birds) might be first on the scene, followed by smaller creatures and finally the microscopic decomposers arrive to finish the decomposition process.  This is Mother Nature’s way of reusing and recycling nutrients. 

Finding a skeleton also allows scientists to study lifestyle and eating habits of this ocelot.  Jackie was surprised when she looked inside its mouth and found several missing or broken teeth, especially the important large canines that ocelots use to catch their prey and the carnassal teeth that are used for tearing their food like a pair scissors.  Notice in the photo that the eye sockets are both in the front of the skull.  This is a good indication that this predator had good stereoscopic vision.

- Fran Zakutansky

Perfect Camouflage - Both Shape and Coloration

As we walked home from dinner last night, my friend, Anna spotted this strange creature hanging from the white railing along the path.  This is the largest walking stick that I have ever seen!  Five of its legs are holding on to the railing, the sixth leg is dangling off to the right.  Having six legs is one of the characteristics that tells you that this animal is an insect. Its head is right next to the tip of Anna’s middle finger and its long tail is hanging straight down.

Thank goodness this walking stick decided to hang out on the railing rather than in a tree.  We never would have spotted it in a tree!  Notice that it is shaped like a thin branch of a tree and it also has the perfect mottled coloration to look like a twig or branch.  Nature creates well-adapted creatures for survival and this is one of my favorites!

- Fran Zakutansky

Frog on a Raft

Frog on a raft

I was out walking in the rainforest and came up to a shallow pond.  As I looked carefully in the pond, I saw thousands of cute little tadpoles swimming around.  As I walked around the pond, I saw the coolest thing.  It looked like a white foam raft about the size of the palm of my hand and sitting pretty on top of the raft was a very small, but adorable frog.  Take a look at the photo.  The frogs make this foam raft by kicking their feet in the water as they release a liquid.  The mother (female) frog lays her eggs into the middle of the raft.

The floating raft is a good adaptation to protect the eggs from hungry predators, prevents them from dehydrating, and protects them from parasites and bacteria.  It’s convenient that the eggs hatch into tadpoles right in the water where the tadpoles swim.  After the tadpoles hatch, the foam disintegrates (it is biodegradable).  After a few weeks, the tadpoles start growing legs and lose their tails and become adult frogs and they look like the frog in the photo perching on top of the foam.

- Fran Zakutansky

Jaws and Claws

Every year when I travel to Barro Colorado Island one specific theme emerges amidst all the astonishing sights and sounds of the forest.

The story begins at boat docks of Barro Colorado Island.

The year of the trogon, the year of the monkey, the year of the tamandua.  This is definitely the year of the crocodile.  I should have known that crocs were going to take center stage when the first animal I saw stepping off the boat was a small mama stretched out on the lake bank, catching the last of the sun’s rays.  My one-woman welcoming committee.

Little Mama Crocodile is quite the welcoming committee.

But “Little Mama” in no way prepared me for what was to come.  Of course I already know crocodiles are mighty predators, and since hunting them was banned in 2000, their numbers have increased exponentially.  I also know this is nesting season for both crocs and iguanas, which doesn’t bode well for the iguanas.  Still no amount of prior knowledge prepared me for what I was about to witness.  A once-in-a-lifetime predation event – at least once in my lifetime.

It all began unceremoniously enough.  As I was relaxing on the balcony of one of the laboratory buildings after a late afternoon hike in the forest, I spied a hefty crocodile near the boat docks on the opposite side of a mesh fence constructed around the perimeter of this part of the island.  We’ll call her Bertha, and Bertha was one big, bad, mean and ugly looking crocodile.

Duuun dun duuun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun…

Just a few meters away, on the ramp leading down to the boat docks, was a solitary iguana, seemingly unaware that a flimsy fence was all that stood between her and certain death.  We’ll call her Iggy.

Innocent Iggy prior to the incident.

I hadn’t yet seen any iguanas this visit and was eager to capture a photo of her.  Stealthily, I crept down the sidewalk leading to the docks, digitally memorializing the moments with every step I took.  Inching my way closer and closer to Iggy, Bertha suddenly shot straight up in the air, seizing a totally different iguana on her side of the fence.  As she rose up I saw Iggy’s cousin hanging out from either side of her jaws before she dove into the lake with her new found prey.

One less iguana on the banks of BCI.

Everything happened so fast; I thought Bertha was coming over that fence for sure and either Iggy or I were goners.  What a total surprise to see in her grasp an iguana I never knew was there.

Diving into the lake to enjoy a tasty late afternoon iguana snack. 

Iggy looked “all shook up.”  After Bertha disappeared into the water she cautiously leaned over the far side of the dock ramp, peering into the water below.

What just happened here?

About that same time I heard a rustle in the leaves at the water’s edge and saw two or three more iguanas hustling up the stalks of the Heliconia, trying to get as high up and as far away from Bertha as they could. 

One iguana sacrificed so the others can live and nest another day. 

Big Bertha remains a formidable force of which to be wary.

- Katrina Macht

Look at those leaves

There are over 300 different types (species) of trees on this small island called Barro Colorado Island (it’s less than 3 miles across), located in the middle of the Panama Canal. 

Cecropia tree

The tree in this photo (Cecropia) has very distinctive lobed leaves.  Can you count how many lobes each leaf has?  Cecropia flowers and leaves are favorite food of kinkajous. 

Kinkajou Photo Source:   www.bite.ca (Photo of the Month:Kinkajou)

Kinkajous are very cute tan furry nocturnal mammals with big eyes, but I would not want a kinkajou as a pet because they like to sleep during the day and stay up at night!

- Fran Zakutansky

Antlion

Antlion Pits

As I was coming back to my home (for the next week, anyway), I saw many little ditches in the dry, sandy dirt near my door.  They were different sizes, but all perfectly formed.  These must be antlion pits (see photo).  The antlion is the larval (baby) form of a lacewing insect.  They are sometimes called doodlebugs because of the designs that they make in the sandy soil as they are looking for a good place to dig their pit).  An antlion looks a like a chubby pillbug with giant pincher jaws.  The antlion uses these massive pinchers to toss sand from the bottom of its pit (sandy ditch) to make the walls so steep that when an ant steps just over the edge of the pit, it slides down the sandy wall and right into the waiting jaws of the antlion.


Take a look at this cross-section photo (from dk images) of an antlion who just captured an ant in its pit. When this happens, the antlion kicks a spout of sand from the bottom of the pit. 

You can see the antlion at work in this video. Look carefully to see its giant jaws doing the digging and tossing. As antlions grow larger, they make larger pits. I bet when I return tomorrow that pit will be all repaired and the antlion will be at the bottom, with jaws protruding, waiting for its next meal.

- Fran Zakutansky

Tarzan would love this forest

As I walk through the dense tropical forest here on BCI, an island in the Panama Canal, very little sunlight reaches the ground because there are so many leaves above catching the rays for photosynthesis.  Plants and trees race to grow tall quickly so they can get above the canopy to the top emergent layer of the forest where sun is plentiful.

Vines are masters of growing quickly to reach the sun because instead of building their own sturdy base and trunk, they grow on tree trunks to reach the precious sunlight.  There are hundreds of different types of vines here. Some are thin with delicate green leaves and others are thick and woody and can be so strong that they actually strangle and kill their host tree.  And you know that some vines are strong enough that Tarzan and Jane could swing on them.

What a great adaptation for reaching the high forest layer quickly by using their precious energy to grow quickly rather than needing to grow wide and sturdy.

- Fran Zakutansky

A real, live Toucan Sam

I cannot believe how beautiful this tropical forest island is.  We are in the middle of a lake in the Panama Canal.  I’m sitting on my balcony as I type this and a toucan is sitting on a tree right in front of me.  I think he is looking at me as much as I’m looking at him.  You can’t miss a toucan-it’s the “Froot Loops Bird”.  His beak looks so large, it almost looks like he might topple forward, but his beak is very lightweight.  He uses this large beak to yank nuts, seeds, and berries off of a tree and then he tosses his head backwards to swallow his food whole.  Like many other birds, the fruit seeds pass through the toucan’s digestive system unharmed and seeds are spread when the bird releases (poops) them far from where he ate the fruit.  He is such a colorful bird!

- Fran Zakutansky

Hangin’ Around

Alarm clock—I don’t need one in the rainforest.  Every morning before dawn (usually around 5:30 AM), howler monkeys are letting us know they are waking up.  I am always surprised that a monkey that only weighs about 12 pounds can make such a loud, deep howl.

Here is what my early morning alarm clock sounds like.  Howlers also howl when they’ve chosen their nighttime sleeping spot (to tell other howler troops to stay away), when it starts raining (maybe they don’t like getting wet), and male howlers howl to keep other males away. 

Howler monkeys have prehensile tails.  This means that they can use their tails to hold on to branches; a very convenient feature to have in the forest.  The first part of this video shows a howler hanging by its tail so its hands are free to eat the juicy fruits from the tree.  The second half of the video gives you a very good look at the howler’s face and hands.  Maybe an appropriate title for this video should be, “does anyone have a napkin that I may use?”

- Fran Zakutansky

Scientists study plants and animals in the forest

I am spending 2 weeks living on a beautiful island (BCI) in the Panama Canal.  The plants and animals are protected and scientists come from all over the world to study them.  The scientists all meet in the dining hall for a delicious dinner after collecting data out in the forest all day.  They discuss what they saw during their field work and sometimes they help each other by discussing questions that arise.  Some scientists stay a few weeks, some stay a few months.

Many return every year to continue their research.  As you walk along the forest trails, you can see how some of the botanists mark their plants and trees so they can be sure that they study the same tree all the time.  See photos that show some of the scientists’ tags that I saw while hiking in the tropical forest.

One scientist has been studying mammals (and doing a mammal census) every year for over 30 years.  She has remote cameras lashed to trees along the trail and when an animal passes by the camera, the camera takes a photo or video.  She has photos of tapirs, ocelots, and pumas that are almost impossible for scientists to see because they are so shy and so well-camouflaged.

- Fran Zakutansky

Recycling in the Forest

"Leaf litter" in the forest

Decomposers are a vital link in any ecosystem, especially in a tropical forest, where soil nutrients are scarce.  When a plant or animal dies, it is important for their nutrients to be recycled quickly so they are available to other plants and animals.  This photo shows fallen dead leaves blanketing the forest floor.  The “leaf litter” would be so thick in no time in a lush tropical forest with many trees if they were not constantly being decomposed.

Termite nest

The big lump on the tree in this photo is a termite nest.  Termites are social insects that live together in large colonies.  They decompose dead trees (wood) with the help of mutualistic protozoans (microscopic single-celled organisms that live in their digestive systems).  Termites help decompose the wood so its nutrients can be recycled.

Fungi on fallen tree

The last photo shows a tree trunk that has died and fallen down.  Notice that the wood is well on its way to being decomposed completely and the white bracket fungi attached to the tree help the process along.

So, you know the saying: REDUCE, REUSE, AND RECYCLE!  This is especially true in the rainforest.

- Fran Zakutansky

The most beautiful butterfly in the world!

Blue Morpho Dorsal

My friend Dot and I were walking to the dining hall on this amazing island in the Panama Canal when a gorgeous bright blue butterfly called a Blue Morpho fluttered just 20 feet in front of us. Since I’m in Panama and they use the metric system, I guess I should really say 6 meters in front of us.  It was iridescent and the sun made it look even shinier.  It was so large that I would have needed both hands to hold it.  But, I would never hold or touch a butterfly because it removes some of its small powdery scales (that it needs for protection and survival).

Blue Morpho Ventral

The most shocking thing was how different its ventral surface (underside) was from the gorgeous blue dorsal surface.  The ventral surface was brown striped with 2 large (and several smaller) eyespots to scare away potential predators. Did you know that butterflies generally rest with their wings folded up like in my photo, while moths usually rest with their wings spread out flat?

Moth keeps its wings spread out while resting

Here is a photo of a very large moth that was on the floor in the lab.  You can see it’s resting with its wings out flat.  I’ve also included photos of both sides of this spectacular butterfly for you. 

- Fran Zakutansky

HUNGRY IN THE RAINFOREST - Plant and Animal Interactions

This pattern is caused by insects feeding on the leaf

If you take a look at these 2 leaf photos, you can see that there have been some hungry critters (mostly insects) in the rainforest.  You can tell what type of insect chewed on leaves by the pattern that you see.  For example, the semi-circular chunks at the edges (margins) of the leaves in one photo are made by leaf-cutter ants.

Leafcutter ants have been eating this leaf

They have giant mandibles (jaws) that they use like scissors to cut off a large chunk of the leaf, then they carry the leaf back to their nest (see photo) where it will be used to help cultivate a fungus garden in the nest.

Carrying a piece of the leaf

The fungus is needed to feed the ant larvae (babies).  Many plants produce toxins to make their leaves less enticing for vegetarian (herbivorous) insects. 

- Fran Zakutansky

Night Hike

With our spotlight charged and ready, we headed out for a short night walk in the rainforest.  You see nocturnal animals at night that are not out during the day. It did not take long for Greg (our premier animal spotter and guide) to find a kinkajou sucking nectar from the flowers in a large balsa tree.

Kinkajou - Image source: www.bite.ca (Animal of the Week:Kinkajou)

There were not too many flowers on the tree, so the kinkajou did a lot of moving from one branch to the next. Look at the photo--I think kinkajous are so cute, but being nocturnal, they do not make good pets since they are awake when I want to sleep at night.

Bufo Toad

The kinkajou was not enough for our short hike, Greg also showed us a giant Bufo toad.  This toad was so large that I would definitely need 2 hands to hold it.  By the way, I did not hold it because I was not sure if it had poison glands in its skin that would cause a rash.  The toad prefers to come out at night because it might dry out in the hot daytime sun and it has fewer predators at night. 

Bat from BCI

And we still weren’t done seeing cool nocturnal animals!  When Greg shined the spotlight to look for animals, we saw dozens of bats flying through the beam of light.  No worries, though, there are 70 species of bats on this island and only one (vampire bat) will bite a human.  If you look carefully at this photo that scientist Rachel Page took, you will see a frog being caught by a frog-eating bat.

Tarantula out at night

Look at the photo of a tarantula that was just sitting out in the open near it’s home (a hole in the ground).  It was looking for a nice meal, but stayed close enough to it’s home that it would not become a meal for another predator.  Well, I have to say, that sure was a power-packed night hike-kinkajou, huge toad, bats, and a tarantula!  Thanks, Greg!  

- Fran Zakutansky

Can you see me now?

Katydid (click to see larger)

Buenos dias!  Every day there’s something new for me to see here on BCI, an island in the Panama Canal.  Today, all I had to do was look on the outside of my room door (that’s why the background in this photo is the white shiny door) to see this really cool insect called a leaf-mimic katydid.  It would camouflage perfectly if it were sitting on a leaf.  I’m not sure why it decided to hang out on my door. It even has pretend leaf veins. I can’t wait to see what living treasures I will find in the rainforest today! 
- Fran Zakutansky

Monkey Business

Capuchin Monkey

I’m staying on BCI (an island in the middle of the Panama Canal) and I have a “room with a view”.  I was sitting on my balcony late this afternoon when a troop of white-faced capuchin monkeys appeared in the trees right over my balcony.  They were heading to their sleeping spot in nearby trees. I got a great view of them as they swung thru the branches.  I will try to return to my room from the forest every afternoon just before dinner to see if they come by again.  This was “monkey business” at its best!
- Fran Zakutansky

Crocodiles

I left cold NJ today and arrived on Barro Colorado Island, in the middle of Gatun Lake in the Panama Canal.  It is about 85 degrees here. Yes, I truly feel like I am in a tropical rainforest!  As I stepped off the ferry (we have to take a boat to get to this island), I saw holes just off the side of the path, not far from the water.  And, on the path dirt from these holes was scattered all around.

Read the sign in my photo.  Several scientists on the island told me that they saw a crocodile sunning itself just a few feet from these newly-dug holes.  I bet she was the “excavation artist” and I hope while I’m here for the next two weeks, I will see crocodile eggs in the hole!  

The crocodile in the photo was sunning itself on the metal mechanism of the canal locks.  I think that this would be a very dangerous place to “hang out”.
- Fran Zakutansky

Agouti

Agouti in BCI

I just arrived on Barro Colorado Island (in the Panama Canal) from NJ.  This island is a protected rainforest with so many plants and animals.  I had not even put my suitcase in my room when I spotted an agouti nibbling on a palm nut.  Agoutis are rodents that are about 14 inches long (about the length from my elbow to my fingertips).  They need to be very aware of their surroundings because there are several predators on this island that might find agoutis to be quite a nice meal.
- Fran Zakutansky

Iguanas and Ocelots

Photo by Greg Willis

In mid-February, the green iguanas start to nest near the BCI dock.  They come down from the trees and some swim across the cove to reach the soft sandy soil of the dock area.  The females have mostly mated already, but some males court them just in case they can fertilize a few more eggs. The females do the work of selecting a safe site and digging a deep hole in which the eggs are placed and buried to hatch several weeks later.  The nesting process lasts for two or three weeks, and the iguanas can be seen leaving, some of them swimming back across the cove.  Sometimes crocodiles nest in the same places, so it can be a busy time.  

Photo by Greg Willis

Jackie and Greg have learned that iguanas are a favorite food of ocelots, but it is difficult to observe this behavior directly.  In 2012, one of the big male ocelots, named Flash, did his hunting when people were present and Greg took these photos.  It was the first time this photography was possible in the 30 years that Greg and Jackie have been studying mammals on BCI.

Ocelots and Camera-traps

Ocelot family on the hunt

The camera-traps of the BCI Mammal Census have been revealing details of the life histories of wild ocelots.  In the past 16 years we have been able to trace the lives of the 20 to 33 resident ocelots.  The number has been slowly increasing since the study began.  For example, Morse Code is a female who had two kittens instead of the usual one, and both were raised to be healthy young adults.  Her kittens are Dot and Dash, and they are now about 2 years old and becoming independent.  The photos show them as they have grown.

--Jackie and Greg Willis