A Crazy Couple of Weeks

Sorry I have not done a great job keeping up with the blog, but things have been CRAZY around here! When my professor arrived at the beginning of the month, it was just Julianne and myself. Now, however, the entire team has arrived and my longest day has been over 20 hours of work! And my "short days" are 12 hours. It took me until Oct. 14 to get my bacteria. Fortunately, they were donated to my project from Laboratorio San Jose, so it saved me a couple hundred dollars. The unfortunate part is, the turtles started coming before I had all supplies (again). Fortunately, I was able to run some experiments right away with the fluid that we collected during the mid-October minibada and found some awesome results! I then got excited about getting a Master's degree because my project was working...and then it stopped working. As a results I have been spending up to 10 hours in the lab in a day trying to get everything to work. In the past week I have had 3 days where I have worked for over 20 hours, including a 40 hr day... I'm sure you can imagine why the old brain is no longer functioning.  However, I do have some cool things to show you...

Some Experimentation.  The zones of no bacterial growth around the white disks on the plate to the left are what I am looking for this season!  Now to repeat those results...

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Day time ridley

Though my project has hit a road block, life in Grande continues and is never short on adventures. My dad came down for a couple of days. Though he did not see a turtle, he did see me chase down a poacher and ask him for the eggs back. This was my first poacher encounter, but far from my first poached nest. He popped an egg in his mouth, decided the entire clutch was no good for eating, and meandered down the beach.  In Costa Rica, it is a delicacy to eat raw eggs with a little hot sauce, thus poachers normally will crack one open and taste it to decide if the rest of the eggs are worth taking.  He explained to me that you can eat eggs, but this particular batch was no good...SO WHAT?! IT'S A NATIONAL PARK AND A THREATENED SPECIES!!! YOU CAN'T EAT THE EGGS! Needless to say, I relocated the eggs to the hatchery so he could not snack on them anymore. I am pretty sure I see him around town now, and he smiles and waves at me, making it super awkward.

Video of a day time olive ridey.  I hope you can see why we clean the beach of logs every once and a while.

Someone clearly doesn't feel rules apply to them, this was after screaming at us for asking her to kindly step away from the turtle. She then proceeded to invite everyone to pet the turtle. This turtle did not nest, but at least they waited for her to turn around.

Other than poachers and long days, the only thing worth mentioning is that a film crew called the other day because they want to film my project. They are doing something with my professor. Basically, they are going around the world for 3 yrs filming research projects, cultural events, and more. This is for 2 tv series and a movie. One of the sponsors of the project is the BBC (Think Planet Earth, Life, and Blue Planet)!   However, I thought I would be back home by the time that they get here, I should be done with lab work, and I should be done with my allotted amount of sample turtles. Still a month and a half away, so I have time to figure stuff out. Well, that's all I have.

And The Thesis Continues...

Well, as positive as I was about my last post being my last post (6 months ago), it turns out there was not enough data for my Master's thesis, and so this blog must continue since my adventures are continuing. So much has happened since I left last February, but I will try to sum it up briefly. However, six months of information not so brief. How did I end up back in Playa Grande without finishing my Master's you ask? Well let me tell you...

I came back to Grande the end of March, hoping for a Miracle. I came back to bring my samples to San Jose as a last ditch effort to salvage my data and have some fungus and bacteria identified. I came back, grabbed my samples, between all of my attempts to identify bacteria on my own then left with Elizabeth and Peter (Elizabeth is the lawyer who basically runs the Leatherback Trust and Peter is her husband who comes to PG with her and watches my DVDs of The Big Bang Theory...AWESOME!). Our first stop on the San Jose trip was to Peter's mother's house...better known as my dream house. Inside of 20ft cement walls was a giant rambler surrounded by Mango trees and the most gorgeous tropical flowers! It was so peaceful; it was like the rest of the city didn't exist. Nevermind the fact that we were less than half a mile away from the brand new national stadium. The inaugural game was against China (the country who gave Costa Rica the stadium) just two days before when I was in Grande. The dedication ceremony was a little like watching the Olympic opening ceremonies. When it was all said and done, the game was tied 3-3.

Me picking a mango at Peter's mom's house

A view of the national stadium it's opening week.


After Peter's mother's house we dropped the samples off at Laboritorio San Jose, and then went to The Leatherback Trust office. No one on my field team had ever been there, so I felt pretty special. We certainly heard a lot about the place so I had to take pics to show I was there.



Mural at TLT office

After that, Elizabeth and Peter drove me around the city. My favorite part of the tour was a super classy restaurant that used to be a monastery and turned the wine cellar into a happening bar. It was far up on a hill and had views of the entire city. Apparently the hosts dress up as friars and bring you to your table. They left the chapel intact for weddings and concerts. It was awesome, and if I was not a broke college student I would have love to have eaten there. They fed me, brought me to my hostel, and the next morning I got into a cab for the airport.


Chapel at La Monestere


The view from the restaurant over San Jose (the stadium is the large fuzzy arch in the middle, towards the back)


When I got home I spent several months looking for a job. I finally settled in on tutoring high school chemistry and puppy/dog sitting until I was hired at the aquarium. Yes, I did get to feed the sharks! And yes, it is as cool as it sounds. After being at my job one month I found out that I was going to have to come back to Costa Rica because there was not enough bacteria and fungus in my samples for a thesis. When bacteria is frozen their concentrations decrease dramatically. This, coupled with ice crystals that lyse viable bacteria with each refreezing episode, made it surprising that any bacteria or fungus was found. All that was discovered was that there were no bacteria in my cloacal fluid samples, hinting that there may be antimicrobial properties deposited with the eggs. So this has become the new hypothesis of my study....Oh the scientific method at work!

After a month of lab training in Ft. Wayne, I finally made it back to Costa Rica! I didn't realize how much I missed it here until I got back. It's been fun getting to hang around with old friends and getting to know everyone. My friend, Julianne, who goes to school with me at IPFW is now taking over the project (Tera's old position). It's been great showing her the ropes, at a much slower pace. The rest of the team does not arrive until mid October, so we have been just doing morning walks, cleaning the lab, and a beach cleanup with the national park, leatherback trust, and guides from both Mata Palo and Tamarindo. Actually, I should say we were doing these things until I got really sick! After a night of being violently ill and sleeping on the bathroom floor, the local doctor sent me an hour away to get blood work done (there are no labs nearby). My blood count was low, so Friday the doctor came to me for another blood sample suspecting I might have Dengue Fever or have caught some terrible virus from the rodents in the lab. So now I am waiting for those results until I can work again. Now, I just need my supplies and a permit to work and I am set!

...And because I know everyone loves the turtle counts, I am happy to report that we have seen 3 new leatherback body pits, 8 olive ridley body pits or tracks, and this morning they ran across a black turtle that was still trying to dig a nest when the sun was starting to rise! It is likely that there have been more nests, but we are not night patrolling and high tide is in the vegetation for most of the beach, wiping away the evidence of nesting. Also, severe rain, winds, and daily thunderstorms make olive ridley tracks difficult to see. Still, not bad for a week of out-of-season turtles.

The Turtle Festival!

Yes, I have been worse then ever with the blog this time! I tried to load pictures twice at the beginning of the month and it took over an hour to load one, but the sea turtle festival entry is nothing without pictures! I am back in the states now and have been for 24 days! I have spent pretty much the entire time looking at jobs and buying a house (it is cheaper in Tacoma to buy a place rather than rent)! However, I still remember my last week in Grande, and the pictures explain everything.

This is Baulita (little leatherback). She was the first car in the parade for the sea turtle festival. From what I hear, the guy in the suit is the same guy that I found a couple months earlier sleeping on a sea turtle nest. I find the costume a little creepy, but I don't like mascots, the kids, on the other hand, LOVE Baulita.

Here is the entire parade. The little boys in the blue shirts are the drum line, and right in front of them are the local drill/dance team.



Each school was responsible for putting on a little play, skit, or song about sea turtle and conservation. These little guys made some other marine animals found in the area and then painted a matching character on their shirts. Imagine me standing in the back of a moving pickup taking all of these pictures... don't try that at home kids!

This school made posters about conservation and the steps people can take to help. This particular poster wants you to ration the resources you consume.

The Playa Grande School

This artist donated a bronze sculpture to the national park and this picture was taken two seconds after it was unveiled. This sculpture, however, did not easily get to Playa Grande! It came from San Francisco and was almost a week late! It arrived in San Jose the night before the festival and there was no time to bolt it down before it was revealed to the public.

 

The bronze sculpture was made to scale, so what you are seeing is actually the size of a leatherback found on our beach! I would also like to mention that I have 2 pictures on the posters in the background of the sculpture! I believe that makes me a published photographer! If you remember Rachel, Matt's assistant from the summer, she had about 15 pictures on the poster, which reminds me...I have to send her the pictures of the poster!

This is recycle art, and I LOVE IT! I really took the pictures so that my mom could do this project with her class... and I love the colors!

...And what is a Central American celebration without dancing and twirling skirts?

These are the Bullis Charter School kids who come down every year from California. They rent out our station and the hotel next door...It was chaos! We took them on estuary tours, salt marsh walks, to the black sand beach, found them a turtle, and more in a week's time. We moved to Kike's for the week. I have to say, the $20 rooms with 5 beds and a kitchen was an amazing deal! Plus the parrots and parakeets loved hanging out in the giant mango tree infront of our porch, so that was fun.
I do have to go back to Playa Grande to bring samples to San Jose, so it looks like there will be at least one more post on this. Perhaps I will post when I have finished the Thesis (which I have barely started writing). Again, sorry this was late.

Life Without Vols

Iguana Necropsy

Now that the volunteers are gone, it feels like every turtle could possibly be my last, at least my last leatherback...of course, now that my project does not appear to be working out, I may be back next year. Just in case, I've been trying to absorb as much of the last couple turtle experiences I've had. I had a black turtle nest hatch, I missed the mass hatch, but I was able to rescue one little hatchling who was being carried away by a crab! He was beautiful!!! Of course, I don't really know if it was a boy or a girl, but the nest was in the shade and due to temperature sex determination in hatchlings, boy seemed to be the most likely choice. Black sea turtle hatchlings are rounder than the others I have seen, and have a brilliant bright white stomach. Even when he was resting on his way to the ocean, his back flippers kept moving...I think he was in a panic about predators. That same night I was also ables to see a black turtle and a leatherback nest, and it was all on Ventanas (the beach that does not get as many turtles) in the full moon light!!!

Our friends' band playing on a night off

I've started looking into some summer jobs and trying to figure life out, mostly I am waiting to hear back from a lab to see if they can process my samples without breaking the bank before I leave in 4 days! That way I know if I still have a Master's thesis. AAAAAHHH! I guess I thought things would be clam and relaxing my last few days here, but I was wrong.

A hatchling from an excavation we showed the sixth graders

Mantis

 

Salt marsh mangroves with salt excretion on leaves

We currently have a group of sixth graders in from California who are presenting at the Sea Turtle Festival here on Saturday, like they do every year. Since I am good with bird identification, at least I seem to like them more than the other biologists, I was sent on bird walks through the salt marsh. There wasn't a whole lot to see, and by the time I pointed out a bird, it was usually gone before the kids could see. However, between the fiddler crabs, a walking stick, a preying mantis, coati, and hummingbirds, the kids saw plenty and were very excited. The kids were also able to see a leatherback who had problems with collapsing egg chambers and left the beach without nesting, and a black sea turtle whose nest had to be relocated because it was below the high tide. Considering we had not seen a turtle in three nights, that fact that we found two and were able to get 40+ people to them was pretty fortunate.

The last week of season has not been just about the turtles, but about having some fun. The whole staff went to the Brazilito festival. Costa Ricans know how to do a fair right! All food is homemade, delicious, and not more that 2 dollars.  There are games, dancing, and a huge rodeo. I paid for parking, ate an arrepa, tamale, and went in on some doughnut holes all for $10...try doing the at the Puyallup Fair! We still had to patrol so we were unable to make it to the rodeo, but it looked fun. There were even some rides and bumpercars! For such a small town it was pretty impressive, but I can't wait to do the Puyallup next year now.

Churros at the festival, Matt says he loved the churro but his face shows differently

Avalon posing for Tera's pic at the festival

I'll probably have one more post from my Costa Rican adventures to cover the sea turtle festival and my leaving, but that won't be until I get home. Hopefully there will be a lot to report, starting with what is happening with the Master's Degree. That is all for now, and I'll see most of you when I get home!...4 days!

Last of the Volunteers

On Friday morning, the last of our volunteer groups will be leaving, that means it really is the end of season. Though the season was long, the last month seems to be going rather fast. My whole master's project is kind of up in the air right now, as I have not heard back from labs to see if they can process my samples. I keep loosing plates to maggots in the lab, no matter how tight I seal them and patch the seals everyday. Not sure why I still use the lab, since the only thing that will save my project at this point is sending them out, but I guess I just feel like if I'm not working, then I'm not trying.

On a more possitive note, look how cute this hatching runt of a ridley is!:

This group volunteer group has 9 people, but there is not enough turtles to go around. I am amazed that we have been able to get everyone to at least see a turtle at all, and for most, it has literally been a single turtle and after the nesting process. We have, however, had a lot of other cool things to keep them entertained. For instance, my first time on morning walk with this group I had a morning ridley, and I was walking to an excavation at 2:30 in the afternoon when my volunteer noticed a single hatchling on top of the berm. I sprinted up there to get him because it was WAY too hot and he could die before he got to the ocean. However, once I reached the top of the berm I noticed it wasn't just the 1 hatchling, but the entire nest erupting. There were far too may hatchlings for my bucket and I was forced to empty my excavation bag and put them in there until the other biologist could run back and get more buckets. Three had already died from the heat, but we were able to save 46!!! We released them at night and they all made it to the water! Fingers crossed that one of those will come back in 15 years to nest (since only 1 out of 1000 hatchlings makes it to adulthood).

The leatherback nest hatching:

The nest exploding with hatchlings

My favorite picture of the season.

 

My lovely volunteer helping me with an overflowing bucket and bag, their reward for going with me to an olive ridley excavation instead of the leatherback nest excavation that the rest of the volunteers went to.

After this excitment, Ashley, my volunteer, and myself went to our ridley excavation that had almost completely died out, probably due to high tides since they were all about the same developement stage and getting close to hatchling. The nest was well below the new spring high tide line (http://home.hiwaay.net/~krcool/Astro/moon/moontides/) and we had just recently had a full moon. Only 8 made it out, 60 stage 3's (about to hatch) were found dead, and maggots cleaned out about 10 eggs, making it impossible to determine their stages. However, one lucky little turtle, a runt if you will, did make it out (pictures above). Good thing we had such good news with the leatherback nest hatching, otherwise it would have been a depressing day with that ridley nest.

There are only 12 more days until I head home and can no longer say I live in Costa Rica. It's kind of bitter sweet, but I am really looking forward to being home. I am trying not to be too stressed about the project and enjoy my last few moments here, but it is quite hard with a Master's project that I thought would be long done by now lingering over my head.

Wrap it up!

I know, it has been a while since I have written a post, and a lot has happened since then. This is going to be difficult to post since the internet has been going in and out for the past 2 weeks or so,  lately it has been 20 minutes no internet, followed by 5 minutes of working internet (though at night when I should be sleeping it works perfectly).

Tiny preying mantis that found his way on to my foot at the beach...in his attack pose!

We are on our final Earthwatch group! I can’t believe the end of season is here! The beginning went by so slowly, but with volunteer groups coming one after the other, spending 6-8 hours a day in the lab, plus the 8 additional hours of beach work, everything has sped up. It was too hot for the last volunteer group to be on the beach during daytime work, so it was a lot of work for us biologists. Usually we have no problems finding people to do excavations, triangulations, and even occasionally temperature, but it was too hot!  The volunteers were all nice and the teachers did a good job at sharing the experience with their schools through Earthwatch’s Live from the Field Program (my mom seriously needs to do it).  I was able to skype a couple of classrooms and answer turtle questions and show them hatchlings that were found during excavations, but I the middle of my lab work so I missed most them.  I recieved my supplies a week later than I had anticipated, an issue because fungus needs a month to grow and I only had 3 weeks from the day I recieved them until my season was over.

Me with Kike's pocket squirrel (he keeps it in his pocket). Some men chopped down his tree and killed his sibblings.  They were trying to kill him, but Kike paid $10 to keep it. His name is Rescate (rescue) for obvious reasons and he ate breakfast with Jac and I one morning.

This brings me to updates about my project. I’m looking into sending out samples because it is significantly cheaper than processing it all in Grande.  I had a microbiologist tell me that I should not have frozen the samples because freezing could kill bacteria with the formation of the ice crystals, but I was instructed that this was the best method given that the turtles were coming before the supplies, so, in order to have any hope of a Master’s, I had to. This, of course, caused me to spent all day sending emails (with our on-again off-again internet) to get other opinions. Fortunately, I have quite the cool committee and Dr. Visalli told me that what I did was the best that I could do and that I still have a project, it’s not ideal, but since I am still getting growth so I must have done something right. He said to process it all, and if it makes sense get a publication, and if it doesn’t, just get the degree and explain how it should be done the next time. Again, not ideal, but completely put me at ease. Now I just need to find a lab for bacterial identification of frozen samples. On the upside for me, downside for turtles, I successfully identified a fungal species that has had 2 papers (one published, one in press) in the past six months which shows that this fungus is having detrimental effects on hatchling success. So far, I have only found it in a cloaca samples, but I’m pretty sure I have 3 more plates with it growing on it. In other bad news, flies have taken over my lab and I am loosing plates at a rate of about 5 per day due to maggot infestations, even with sealing my plates. Another reason to give the samples to the lab, which I think will cost me $4,000- $5,000 for both bacteria and fungus, so good thing I took out extra loans because I cannot ask my advisor for that, but it is cheaper than sending me back here another year with airfare, living expenses, and supplies/sending samples out. So I’m hoping to find a place quickly so I can figure it out before I leave.

Fusarium (a fungus) a.k.a. hatchling killer!

Finally, Jac (college roommate) and Julianne (friend from IPFW who is taking over the station for Tera next year) both came last week. It was a nice little break.  Julianne was especially good at calming me down, something we had lots of practice doing for each other with tests and projects in grad school. More importantly, it was a surprise that everyone kept from me until 4 days before she got here. Jac was great to see too because it has been far too long. Unfortunately, it was a lot more of me working at the pool in the shade with my computer then hanging out and relaxing, but she got sun! And true to form, the wind picked up one day and blew my notes into the pool…But it’s ok, they weren’t ruined somehow, and I had backups!
 

Jac and I at Kike's.

Me "relaxing" by the pool. Mostly using the internet for project emails and researching fungus because our internet is down.

Other than that, I am just trying to get home in 2 weeks and enjoy the rest of my time here while tying up a bunch of loose ends and wrapping up the project. I’ve started applying for jobs back home, two at the zoo, one as a sea kayaking guide in the San Juans with orcas, and still looking for more because I am beyond broke!

Another brief update

Well, Playa Grande is for the most part the same ole' same ole'. Volunteers come, volunteers go, turtles comes, turtles go, and a lot of restless nights. However, some things out of the ordinary have happened lately. For instance, I just found out the Julianne, a fellow IPFW student with Frank, is coming on Tuesday! Kim and I are so excited because she really is AMAZING and it will be nice to have one of our friends from outside the station here. Also, my roommate from college, Jac is coming in about a week, so I am excited about that. The only problem is, I have so much work to do.   I really just want to hang out with the two of them. Needless to say, If they want to see me, they are going to have to patrol with me.

I'm waiting on what I hope is the last of my plates to get here so I can get the fungus growing because it can take up to a month, which I am now a couple days shy of. I told Frank I needed to reorder supplies, but it costs way too much here for what I need (nearly 4x the amount it does in the states) which would make it more cost efficient to send out my samples than to identify them myself. Needless to say, I am preparing myelf to be dropping a couple thousand of my own dollars on my project to get some lab work done. Good thing I took out some extra in my loans and have a Research Assistantship because I'm pretty sure that is where all the money is going to go. However, I am afraid I am now stuck in panic mode for the remainder of my project trying to ID as much as I can so I limit the cost of lab work. VAMOS A VER!

Some flowers by the hatchery that are in season right now.

The last group of volunteers was awesome! It was a bunch of middle-aged women who have done so many cool things. It was also nice because they got along like old friends. One of the ladies is a nurse in Spokane.   It was cool to have the Washington connection. Another lady decided she had enough of "the man" and quit her job to go on cross-country bike trips. I found that incredible, and wish if I were unhappy with my job I had the courage to quit and do what I want for a while. However, I don't have a real world job, or money, so it's not currently a problem (and working with turtles is awesome!)

Another one of the vols was a teacher doing a "live from the field" project through Earthwatch, which is something I think my mother would love to do. She was always skyping classrooms and writing daily in her blog. (Sorry, I don't have that time or patience). It was nice to have a real fun group of volunteers, because I often find myself stressed with splitting time between the beach, lab, and the volunteers. This time it didn't feel like work! We were also blessed with many turtles while they were here. There was one night where we had 5 turtles.  One of the ladies had not seen one, so we woke her up in the middle of the night to come to a leatherback where there were no tourists and she showed up on the beach with her work shirt and night gown to count eggs. Pretty dedicated if you ask me.  Although that is to be expeced from someone who worked at the EPA for 30 some years. Besides turtles, we were also visited by monkeys at the house while they were here, and now that I have my new camera, I got some great pics.

If you look closely, you can see the baby.

This is my favorite.

We also had a film crew, that is shooting a 12min documentary for The Leatherback Trust, come through.  They seemed to make it more play time than work time, and left us with a bunch of cleanup to do before the new vols got here. We did, however get them to a  turtle, and they were able to see hatchlings that hatched in our hatchery in the middle of the day. Apparently someone put the cover on the nest wrong and hatchlings had escaped and were running all over the hatchery when the volunteer came across them. We put them in buckets and released them at sunset so the film crew could get some good shots (and me with my camera). Unfortunately, 50,000 tourists came and ran all over (more like 25, but it was a lot).  Some guy that lives on the beach didn't want to be told he can not have his dog off the leash running through the hatchlings. He yelled at us saying it was his home, he's lived here for 12 years, and he can't be told what to do...IT'S A NATIONAL PARK!!!

  One of the cool things about being in a national park is you get to see cool life which is being conserved for the future, such as endangered leatherback hatchlings. He didn't care, instead he threw his dog's frisbee right in front of the hatchlings and turned to give us a smug look. I wanted to punch him in the face, I think he should be kicked out of the national park for that. Also it is important to note that dogs, by law, are not allowed, but with being so understaffed, it is rarely enforced. All we asked was that they walked above where the hatchlings were and put their dog on a leash for 2 seconds! You can see it in one of the photos below.

Someone had a little trouble orienting to the beach and preferred my foot.

Man throwing frisbee to dog, his wife, the film crew, and hatchlings everywhere.

Hatchlings

Tracks at sunset

Small portion of the tourists