Out of the Camp and into the Jungle

When I left off last, we just set out walking in the early hours of the morning. As I mentioned before, night time in the field is colder than it is in town. This is feeble, though, and fades as soon as the sun is properly awake. Thankfully we reached the trail into the forest, before the heat picked up, and found ourselves under the shade of the trees.

(The forest)

Dennis, our guide, was sure footed, maneuvering his way within the jungle at a blistering pace, leaving the rest of us behind. (As I became more experienced, I learned this is true of all amerindian guides). Willow, on the other hand was at least a foot taller than I was (and two or more feet taller than Dennis), and kept up with relative ease. Lainy and Claire were accustomed to this, and kept their pace well, leaving Leram and I struggling. Every now and then Leram or I would get distracted by something we saw in forest, or simply just by the surroundings themselves. Occasionally they would all stop for a second and point off in the distance, hearing a bird call we hadn't, in a direction we were unsure of.

(Distractions like the lichen on this rotten stump)

(Apparently green is a distracting colour in the forest)

This went on until we stopped for a short break. Willow produced a portable speaker system and played the call of the bird we were searching for, to familiarize us. Then, handing us some bags of nets and rope, her and Claire went off by themselves to investigate a site further away. The rest of us head off in the opposite direction, searching for the elusive black manakin.

The call of the black manakin

(funny enough, this is the very same call she played for us. 

imagine the smile I had when I found it online)

During our hour or so of walking, we heard them maybe only once. The calls of birds in the wild are many and varied, and as such, without experience, their identification is difficult. There are other more indirect methods one can use to find animals, though. In this case, as Lainy told us, manakins were especially fond of Melastome berries (family: Melastomataceae), and after locating a few of these and some fruiting trees, we found our sites and set up the mistnets.

(Mistnets being set up)

The setting up and of mistnets is similar to packing for me; something I've gotten quite adept at over time, but also a minor inconvenience I will continue to rue every single time without fail. Like packing, I'll discuss in more detail later on. Mistnetting is a passive method of surveying, so most of the time mistnetting is spent simply waiting, and walking. Like all methods, though, there is a certain danger posed to the animals being sampled. Birds have a risk of overheating or getting soaked in the rain, and as such, mistnets must be checked every hour without fail. Our distance from camp made walking back and forth completely inefficient, so we found a small clearing with some logs, and there we sat for the majority of the time we were there.

It's things like these, though, that make fieldwork so great. In the lack of technology, you either spend time with the surroundings, or the people you're with. Lainy, who had been exhausted on the bus and did not speak much, was now quite animated and we soon became well acquainted. When there was no conversation, often there was the wind blowing through the leaves, or the odd bird calling in the distance, or even, just a comfortable silence. Soon, we caught a anticlimactic manakin female in the nets. After taking the measurements, Lainy released her, and we set off to camp for lunch.