Creativity overload, Scotland - Paraguay exchange and colouring in to save the cerrado!

Hi folks, Creativity is the theme of this weeks blog. Not only do we have an amazingly creative group but we also have a new community outreach project to tell you about. Last week we had 4 arrivals; Joe our new member of staff and 3 volunteers, Elizabeth, Maia and Leo. There are now 13 of us in the house and what an amazingly creative group! Zander has taught everyone how to crochet and we now have a house full of hats and gloves that these guys have made themselves. There is also a PLT monopoly board with species instead of properties and community chest cards with instructions such as “you get a paper published in Nature win 500,000” or “horses trampling your pitfall trap line miss a go”. And of course the currency is in Guaraní! With a group this creative it would have been foolish of us not to take full advantage of this skill base and so that is exactly what we have been doing. All of our moths and butterflies are now pinned and our colouring book for the local children is coming along in leaps and bounds thanks to Rosemary’s amazing artistic talent. Our signs around the reserve have received not only a paint job but have been decorated with pictures of local animals and the new museum displays are starting to look pretty amazing. The colouring book I mentioned is part of a community outreach project that we have recently got off the ground. The people in the nearby villages receive only a very basic level of education and there is little or no focus on creativity largely due to a lack of resources. However from experience we know that any opportunity for the children to be creative is met with a lot of enthusiasm. With this is mind we felt that producing a colouring book of the animals and plants in the reserve would be a great opportunity to teach the children about the cerrado and we hope it will help raise awareness about this important habitat from an early age. The colouring book is only a small part of this project however. We have teamed up a school in the local village with a school in Scotland and each child now has a pen friend in the other country. The children exchange postcards from their home country and the school in Scotland have also produced a colouring book so the children here have an opportunity to discover the species from another country and vice versa. This project has only just begun and we have more ideas in the pipeline that we hope will enable the children from both countries to learn about the cerrado and how important it is to protect this unique habitat. And finally this will be my last blog for a while as I am heading off on holiday next week for a 6 week stay in the oh so exotic United Kingdom (no the irony of taking a summer holiday in the UK does not escape me). While I can’t say I am looking forward to the weather I am REALLY looking forward to seeing my family and friends again after 16 months away (but maybe not as much as I am looking forward to eating mushrooms and hummus!). See you in a couple of months and don’t discover a new species for science without me! Hx

The museum opens, the volunteers turn over and the armadillo finally gets stuffed!

Roll up, roll up, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, it gives me great pleasure to announce the grand opening of the one, the only, Para La Tierra Natural History Museum. Yes you guessed it folks we have opened the new museum and I have to say we are all rather proud of our efforts. We actually opened on 21st June and held a little ceremony for the volunteers staying here. Following a short speech, Karina cut a ribbon and we gave a tour of the exhibits. There is still a lot to do on our displays, large map and photo wall but it is shaping up nicely and I have already given 2 tours to tourists, one of whom gave a donation in dollars! The new museum opening isn’t just a landmark day for us here at PLT it is also a reflection of just how much hard work has been put into the species inventories by volunteers and interns over the last couple of years. Who would have thought that our collection would grow so quickly and we would need a new building after only 2 years? Well done and thank you to all our visitors, past and present for making it what it is today. If you would like a virtual tour of the museum you can find a short film on our Facebook page where there are also pictures. Or if you are not friends with us (yet) it can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3UoxvVhztk Last week, in between getting the museum organised we had a massive turn over of volunteers. Sadly we have now said goodbye to Nick, Noah and Dec; 3 wonderful interns who undertook 2 fantastic projects. But we are delighted to welcome in Jess (US), Zander (US), Rosemary (UK) and Rachel (UK). You’ll notice that we have 2 from the UK and 2 from the US which now means that we have an equal number of Brits and Americans. Needless to say this has resulted in some lively conversations over the pronunciation of oregano, Iraq, tomato and vitamin! The camaraderie has been great fun and so was Independence Day weekend which would probably have gone uncelebrated had we not had the US faction with us. Jess and Rosemary have joined the primate project and are having a great time hacking through the forest, Rachel has an interest in invertebrates and has been getting involved with not only our butterfly and moth collection but has also been discovering some of the beetles that Sabrina is working with. And Zander is trying his hand at all of the projects that are running at the moment and has also taught everyone how to crochet! We have a really creative group here at the moment which coincides perfectly with the upcoming museum jobs. I have also been developing my newly found interest in taxidermy and this week I stuffed an armadillo. Well. Stuffed isn’t the right word, more mounted. I was actually given the skin and shell of this specimen for Christmas and it has been in the freezer until now as we simply didn’t have space for it in the old museum. I have been itching to get my hands on it for the last 6 months and this week the day finally came. There wasn’t enough skin left on the underside to stuff it and sew it back up again and when I started to sew it I quickly realised (by breaking 2 needles) that armadillo skin is not a pleasant material to work with. So I changed tactic and made a frame (table). The skin then went around the table so that the shell covered the surface and the legs and feet were surrounding the table legs. And then, as it was originally invented for surgery, I used superglue to hold it all together. I squashed it between 2 boxes to ensure it held its shape while it dried and the end result is not too bad. This may not been the most conventional of methods but we now have an armadillo standing up looking like a, well, an armadillo! And that’s about it for this time, see you in a fortnight. Hx

Introducing Joe

Hello All, My name is Joseph Sarvary and I am the newest addition to the PLT team. I am a 22 year old biologist that recently graduated from Tufts University. I first found out about Para La Tierra in 2010 when I came as an intern to do a population study on Clyomys laticeps and spent two and a half wonderful months at RNLB. I have amazing memories of that summer, not only of the wonderful people and beautiful vistas but also of the satisfaction of conducting real field research. I felt a true connection to the place and the people and I knew by the time I left that it wouldn’t be forever. I returned again for another two month stint before I started a semester abroad in Buenos Aires. By this time my Spanish had improved and I made a point to befriend the guardabosques living on the reserve. Jorge and Concepcion became my close friends and it has been very nice to return to see them again. While returning as an employee has been a different experience, I feel the same close connection with everyone here on the reserve. One thing that strikes me is that while all the volunteers and interns are different, the PLT house still has the same familiar close-knit chemistry that attracted me to it initially. Yesterday was full of adventure for me. Elizabeth and I spent the morning fiddling around with the new camera traps in an attempt to capture some large mammals on video and then spent the afternoon getting ourselves slightly lost in the Atlantic forest. After getting back, Jorge offered to show me to a small grapefruit grove hidden in the forest where we collected over a dozen fresh grapefruits. They were DELICIOUS. On returning, Jorge I and a few volunteers began a game of volleyball on the beach and played until the sunset. It was a really fun game that reminded me of the games I used to play the first time I visited RNLB. I am still re-acclimating to life on the reserve but I am feeling a mixture of nostalgia for my previous experiences here and excitement about what the future might offer. The first task that I have been assigned is a community outreach project that will begin early next week. I’ll be sure to let you all know how that goes as soon as I can. Until next time, Joe

Infrared LIGHTS, CAMERA trap – MAMMALS

Yes you guessed it folks the camera traps are coming up with the goods and its all about the big mammals. A few weeks ago we were delighted by our first fuzzy shots of a feline in the reserve and now we are happy to report we have much clearer pictures of this elusive creature. We can now confirm it is a Little Spotted Cat (Leopardus tigrinus). It remains to be seen whether it is the same individual but we are over the moon with these clear shots. But the cat is not all, we caught a Southern Tamandua on the cameras recently too. It is possible this is the same animal we rescued and released back in December, which would be great, but there is also a chance this is a separate individual which, in a lot of respects, would be even better. However we need shots of its vest pattern to confirm this and unfortunately we didn’t get that picture (this time). It’s not just the camera traps that have been documenting mammals; Rich had a wonderful experience in the transitional forest recently when he had the privilege of watching 3 Tayras for over 5 minutes. He was able to get both photographs and some video of these wonderful mustalids; so we can definitely add them to our species list. And sometimes you don’t even need to leave the house to find mammals they literally just fly at you. A Glossophaga soricina or Pallas’s Long-tongued Bat did exactly that in the stock room and we soon understood just how it had earned its common name. Its tongue, with an amazing brush tip, was enormous! It feeds on night flowering trees and it uses its tongue to access the nectar, making it the mammal equivalent of a humming bird. Although it wasn’t a new species for our collection it was the first one I’ve seen and has just added to my fascination with these wonderful flying mammals. And finally some great news. Recent visitors and volunteers can not have helped but notice that building work has been in progress near our museum. Well it’s now complete and we are delighted to inform you that we have a new museum! It’s been over 2 years since we started a museum collection and we have been so busy that we have literally grown out of the old building leaving no space to house our collection. Having a new museum means we not only have space to store and display our specimens but we can produce education materials to raise awareness about the fauna and flora of Laguna Blanca. We are currently awaiting some tables to be made but hope to have the museum open and ready for visitors by the end of next week. I am so looking forward to getting in there and getting creative. Thanks for reading folks Hx

Newly documented behaviour in the bedroom and buckets of poo!

Several months ago I was delighted to catch a Monodelphis kunsi in one of my pitfall trap lines. This species of opossum was a significant find as it was only the 4th record in Paraguay and the 11th in the world. A week ago not one but two more appeared in the traps. As there is so little known about this species we are currently studying some of their behaviours. So after going to great lengths to make them both large and comfortable enclosures (next to my bed no less), the first thing I was able to establish was just how good the male was at escaping! Despite my best efforts he has escaped twice and is currently AWOL. However as he didn’t get far last time I am hopeful he will reappear in a couple of days, keep your fingers crossed for me guys. My female, Delilah, however is a wonderful study animal and is giving me lots of great data on the diet of this species. I’ll keep you posted as to how I get on with this one. The M. kunsi aren’t the only arrivals we have had at the reserve, last week we were delighted to welcome Scott Felgner and Sabrina White (apologies for that extremely tenuous link there!). Scott is planning a 4 month stay with us and will be going out with Jonny and the primate team to help with the habituation of our group of capuchins. Sabrina is studying entomology (insects) and has some rather interesting means of capturing beetles. So it seems that beetles aren’t called dung beetles for nothing. And horse manure really isn’t getting the results she needed. So with 12 volunteers in the house and there being a global water shortage… well yes you guessed it, human poo really is the best bait to use! Thank you very much to all the boys in the house who have donated so far, the girls have been a little less forthcoming! And finally from human waste to compost and the garden as a whole actually. I am delighted to report that things are really going on in there. The tomatoes have gone crazy and are fruiting wonderfully, we have picked our first crop of green peppers and the chillis have turned into a delightful red (but aren’t very hot by anyone’s standards!). We also have a squash dominating a whole vegetable patch and the passion fruit are finally beginning to flower. Thank you also to Maria and Sabrina for helping me dig some soil from the forest for my new raised bed and to Dec and Rich for getting it out of the car and into the garden. I am really looking forward to seeing what will grow in there! Right that’s me for another fortnight; I’m off to pick some tomatoes. Chauuuuuuuuuu Helen

A State of Equilibrium and Covering up Our Dirty Little Secret

A couple of weeks ago I dropped Mick and his family off at the bus terminal in Santa Rosa and collected two new arrivals. Inge, from Denmark, has joined the primate team and Kelsey from the USA, is a general volunteer and is helping out with the many projects we have running at the moment. Their arrival marked the beginning of a period of calm; you could say equilibrium, here at Laguna Blanca. Much as I enjoy the high turn over of volunteers we have passing though here, there are also rare occasions when we have a few weeks with no arrivals and departures. It’s at these times when I get the chance to pause for a moment and reflect on what a wonderful life I lead and how lucky I am to be here. And so with that in mind I thought this would be a good opportunity to give you the reader a taste of what a typical day at Laguna Blanca is like. There are currently 10, soon to be eleven, of us in the house. Our mornings begin at first light which is when traps need to be checked. So everyone who is undertaking fieldwork us usually up and fed by 6am. The primate team head out into the forest on our motocart and spend a few hours looking for the monkeys in an effort to increase their contact time and work towards habituating the group. This will then be followed by machetting new trails in order to open up the forest to allow further access to the monkeys. Nick and Noah are studying the opossums we have here and so check the traps each morning. Rich has just had his proposal approved and will beginning trapping and recording the behaviour of Microteiid lizards this week. Dec is running the camera trap project so is moving his traps on a regular basis and Augusta is out in the cerrado getting filthy measuring Clyomys burrows. By mid-morning/lunch time everyone is back at the house. Nick and Noah might have a small mammal for me to process for the museum and Dec doesn’t get any peace and quiet until he has seen if there was anything on the cameras! After a hearty lunch the volunteers all work on a number of tasks needed to help keep this place running; varnishing butterfly boxes, painting signs, improving our maps, laminating photographs etc all of these small but significant jobs are so important to us here at PLT. It’s not just the little jobs that the volunteers do to help keep this place amazing. Last week we took on a massive job. Here in rural Paraguay there is NO environmental awareness and waste management or recycling are simply not concepts people understand. So for us as an environmental organisation it is a real challenge disposing of waste. We reuse what we can, glass jars or bottles for example are used in the museum or as vegetable patch borders and cans can be sold for a small amount of cash. Beyond that however the only options we have are to burn or bury our waste and with limited space the latter has now become a problem. We had a couple of large pits behind the house where non-burnable waste was being “disposed” of. However over the months these have overflowed and needed a good sort out. So that is exactly what we did! All of us took it on one morning last week and in the space of two hours had collected, sorted and organised all of the rubbish from the two pits and the surrounding area. Plastic bottles, cans and glass jars that had made their way in there have been removed and sorted for various projects we have coming up, tins are ready for collection and best of all the two pits are now buried and a massive new pit has been dug. Not only that but we now have a fully functional fire pit once again and on our next trip to Santa Rosa we will buy some new big bins so we can continue separating our waste and keep this good thing going. All of our volunteers past, present, and I am sure future, are so precious to us at Laguna Blanca, we simply could not do what we do without them. And it is nice on occasion to have the chance to sit back and reflect on what a great project I work for. “Volunteers aren’t paid, not because they are worthless, but because they are priceless” (Anon)

Here we are, this is Paraguay. Amazing.

First I will introduce myself a little bit. My name is Noah Slot, 21 years old and born in the Netherlands. I am studying wildlife management in Leeuwarden, the Netherlands. I am in Paraguay for my final thesis, so almost done with school! Today it’s the 28th of April, 2 p.m. and the weather is s**t. No worries. We’ve got loads of cozy places, loads of space, loads of nice volunteers, interns and researchers, a projector and enough DVDs here in the field station of Para la Tierra. I think today it’s going to be ‘2 fast, 2 furious’. Good choice, right?! These afternoons are really relaxing and cozy. Especially after a long, interesting and demanding morning of work. Other, let’s say sunny afternoons, are filled with swimming in one of the most clear lakes I’ve ever seen, playing volleyball with everybody and/or reading on the porch, with jungle sounds in the background. Or listening to reggae, Spanish music and R&B. But at the moment I am the only one who likes that… A little bit more about the research I am working on. I am here together with a fellow student, Nick Pruijn, from my university, to do our final thesis. We’re both from Holland and will be here for 3 months in total. Unfortunately only 3 months. Our final thesis is on the Vertical Stratification of Gracilinanus agilis, Cryptonanus chacoensis and Marmosa constantiae in relation to morphometry and habitat structure in the Cerrado, Transitional Forest and Atlantic Forest habitat types. Clear enough? Basically we’re trying to catch as many opossums as possible to find out whether there is or isn’t a relationship in morphology, occurrence at different heights and preferred vegetation characteristics for each species. This is important to know because, maybe you didn’t know this, opossums have been shown to play an important key role in neotropical forest ecology through being seed predators and dispersers, pollinators, regulators of insect populations and a food source for predators. Therefore, changes in their abundances affect forest regeneration and succession. Thus a very important and interesting animal if you ask me. Besides this, all species are also very cute looking and wicked to see. Especially while they are trying to run away from you as fast as possible, on the thinnest branches you can imagine. We’ve been here for about a month now. Time flies. After loads of preparation work, such as reading books on the porch, swimming and volleyball. …Oh I mean; cutting trails in to the dense forest, placing and hoisting traps in to the trees, hoisting them again because the string snapped, preparing bait, baiting traps, carrying out vegetation measurements, you name it. Finally we’ve started catching animals last week! And that is amazing! We’ve caught about 10 opossums, 2 Marmosa and 8 Cracilinanus so far and loads of other ground, arboreal and canopy rat species. Important and really nice to catch as well, but less important for our study. I can go on for ages, but guys, ‘2 fast, 2 furious’ is waiting for me! I can write whatever I want, but you really have to experience it yourself to know how awesome it is! Words can’t describe it. Para la Tierra, keep up the good work! … And enough beer, that’s always good. Pura Vida, Noah Slot