Quebrada Grande 16 AMpTue, 29 May 2007 09:07:20 +000007Tuesday 2007

At the foot of Rincon de la Veija, a lazy old volcano that has bubbling mud pits, hot springs, and numerous steam vents, rests a little pueblo called Quebrada Grande (translation: Big Stream). About 400 people live here, and it is split into three neighborhoods. The village has a grade school, a central park, one church (in picture above), one bar, and a dozen little pulperias (small stores that sell necessities, often a part of a person’s house). The bar is one huge, cavernous room with perfectly polished floors, a very worn pool table, and an inconspicuous little bar tucked into the corner. It is set up more for dances than anything else – which they have about once a month here, and where men and women meet to salsa and meringue. The town is surrounded by farms, so it is common to see a horse with saddle roped to a fence post near a pulperia, waiting for the rider to return after picking up some local cheese. The climate is much cooler here and it rains daily – much more than it does a few hundred feet below, where we had been living.

For the last two weeks, we have been living in a dense neighborhood of this town called barrio del angel (translation: angel neighborhood). Here the houses are packed together, and all are more or less the same. Everybody has a small back yard, where neighborhood chickens roam, where roosters cock-a-doodle-doo throughout all hours of the day, and where the dogs seek out a patch of shade to cool off in. This barrio consists of two blocks and about 60 houses. On our street alone, there are at least five people who work for the same park where we do our research. One of these five is Lenin, the park guard who so graciously escorted us to the police station and waited with us for a long 4 ½ hours while we reported the robbery.

Our crew is growing today – Margaret will arrive this evening to join Selvino, Jen and I. There is barely enough room in this house for three of us, so we have been looking high and low for another place to live which is near the park, is big enough to accommodate four of us and is affordable. This is a tall order, since there are so few houses around the park. Our only option, after much searching, is located about 15-minutes south of the park entrance just off the Interamericana Highway. Today we will start moving there.

Although I will be happy to live in a place where we can all have a lot more space, I will miss Quebrada Grande, a village that I have enjoyed so much, with its welcoming community and small-town atmosphere. Although I might not miss the roosters crowing at 2am…

Transition 16 PMpMon, 21 May 2007 22:21:15 +000021Monday 2007

The habitat in lowland Northwestern Costa Rica is dominated by dry forest, which has distinct wet and dry seasons. During the wet season (roughly May thru October or November), insects are abundant. At the beginning of this period, one must get used to the simple fact that if in the forest at this time, caterpillar poo (known as frass) will rain on them. A sound similar to the “Snap, Crackle, Pop” of Rice Crispies, just after milk has been poured, resounds as frass falls from freshly chewed leaves to the ground below. Amphibians and reptiles are abundant, and mammals enjoy fruiting trees and plenty of prey to eat. And birds, well, they sing a lot, which is why we’re here.

At this moment, we are right at the beginning of the wet season. The dry season (roughly November thru April) is a time for animals to lay low and wait it out until next May. The leaves of most trees drop and everything turns a golden brown. Insects are scarce, and one can enjoy a mosquito-less environment, a true luxury. Leaves crunch underfoot. Small skinks foraging on the ground make so much noise that I often expect to see a white-tailed deer or a tapir instead. But these conditions are quickly fading away as rains come more frequently, as they have been over the last week.

Although they have been nesting for nearly a month now, the recent rains have finally pushed our study species, the banded wren, to start singing at full force. Starting at dawn, they belt out impressively loud songs for a 20-gram bird, and do so for a few hours, when their singing tails off and they concentrate on foraging or building nests. Now we can really get to work, and especially in light of the recent happenings, it feels good that our birds are getting all riled up.

The longest night 16 PMpSat, 19 May 2007 22:10:21 +000010Saturday 2007

The night of May 10^th was the longest night ever. I can say with confidence that it was the worst night of my life. Which is amazing, when I think about how many nights I’ve experienced – almost 10,000. Let me set the scene – while in the field for the last 4 years I have lived in a secluded house here in Costa Rica, about 0.5 km off the Interamericana highway (Costa Rica’s main thoroughfare). The house, referred to as Centeno, is owned by the park, has electricity and running water, but no phone or other means of communication. It is a beautiful location, very tranquil and surrounded by wilderness. Until that night, I had thought of it as a safe haven. Here is a brief break-down of what happened:

May 10th

8:00 pm – I heard strange noises, branches cracking, men talking. Thought it was my imagination, or animals, or something else.

8:30 pm – Sandy, the only other individual with me at Centeno, went to bed.

9:00 pm – I realized that there were definitely people outside our house, but that they were surrounding us, and that we couldn’t get away at that point. I hoped that they would just take our stuff outside and leave.

10:00 pm – I decide to turn the lights off and go to bed, even though there were still noises outside. I left my clothes on, clutched my little flashlight and decided that I could use my drinking glass as a projectile weapon if need be.

10:20 pm – A loud BANG at the door – they are trying to break in! Adrenaline takes over and I turn on all of the lights, scream, wake Sandy and bang the inside of the door to try and scare them off. I hear footsteps scuttle away, and hope that they have left.

10:25 pm – They come back to the door. I can see their feet in the small space under it.

10:27 pm – They knock on the door and ask us to open it. Yeah right!

10:28 pm – Realizing that we weren’t just going to open the door, they try to knock it in. Sandy and I hold it closed.

10:29 pm – They realize that they can just break through the window. I pick up a mist net pole with a pointy end and start jabbing it in their direction, but then I see a gun pointed right at me. I drop my weapon, they blindfold us, tie our hands behind our backs, and put us in a small room.

10:30 to 11:10 pm – They take many things, often asking where our cash is, where the computers are, etc. I plead with them not to hurt us, and ask that they just take our things and leave.

11:10 pm – They leave, after telling us not to move for 2 hours and tying the door to our room shut.

11:20 pm – Sandy works her hands free and unties me. Then we just sit there, shocked and not knowing what to do with ourselves

11:45 pm – We work up the courage to try and get out of the room. After a few minutes, we manage.

May 11th

12:00 am – Start assessing what has been stolen. Meanwhile, I am hungrier and thirstier than ever – the adrenaline surge boosted my metabolism, and I drink glass after glass of water.

12:30 am– Compile a list of what they took, then sit and stare into space for a while longer.

1:00 am – Devise a plan for getting help at first light.

1:30 am – Decide that we will try and sleep, but neither of us manages a wink of it.

4:00 am – I get out of bed and watch the sun rise from in the house. I first watch the shapes emerge from the blackness, then the colors.

5:00 am – Sandy and I open the door to the outside, walk around, see what they took from the outside and what they didn’t.

5:10 am – Eat a small breakfast. Pump up the bike tires.

5:20 am – Ride the bike into the park (about 10 km), and feel renewed. The birds are all singing, the air is still cool, and I am alive and well!

After 5:30 am – I make it to the Comedor and get help. A park employee drives me back to Centeno, where we pick up Sandy.

7:00 am – Go to Poco Sol, where the park guards are stationed. Many questions.

9:00 am – A park guard takes us to the police station in Liberia.

9:30 am to 1:30 pm – We tell our stories at least 3 times to 3 different people. We’re both dead tired. We look at a line-up of suspects, but neither of us recognizes any as the burglars.

The story goes on from there, but I won’t bore you with the little details. In the end, I feel very lucky that neither Sandy nor I were hurt, and that only our things were taken. They took mostly small portable electronics and equipment, as they were on foot. Among other things, they took my deodorant – my bamboo-scented deodorant for women only. Two whole sticks of it. They did stink, so have at it boys.

The park employees have all been sympathetic and helpful. None of them would like to see anybody go through this, and they have done everything that they can to help us. I have a new respect for the locals here and what they do to keep this place safe and running. Also, so many people back home have made it possible to go on. Thanks to everybody for being there for me!

Now, we have moved out of Centeno and have found a cute little house in Quebrada Grande, a village nearby. More on that coming soon…

Tamandua duo 16 PMpTue, 08 May 2007 17:26:52 +000026Tuesday 2007

About a week ago, I had a blockbuster day while following a particular banded wren (more on that later). Honestly, I didn’t do much following and I did a whole lot of gawking as I witnessed such good glimpses of animals that aren’t often easy to see, all within 10 minutes. Two highlights were a male mantled howler monkey actually moving (they are usually lethargic, resting high in a tree – which is why many field guides describe them as being “depressed”), and a coatimundi moseying across the park road. But the most exciting sight was a female tamandua, an anteater related to sloths, toting a half-sized juvenile on her back. These animals look both sophisticated and silly at the same time – sophisticated because of the black vest that they wear in their coat of fur, and silly because of their long snout specialized for raiding termite nests. When they’re alarmed they will climb up a tree, but it is said that they have a short-term memory of disturbance and will soon climb down – which is exactly what happened while I was following the pair, and when I got the shot above.