June 4, 2006 at 7:40 pm (Risa Walters)
The other day I was hiking along a trail on the island, brushing away leafy branches in my path, ripping away vines attempting to grasp hold of my clothing as if I was a tree, and kicking over logs and rocks on my search for a goldmine of isopods when a thought crossed my mind: If this is work, I wouldn't want it any other way. Dirty fingers, muddy hands, a sweaty brow, overlooking the corrugated waters of the Panama Canal from the balcony in the evenings or on days off, and not having to stare at blank walls, participate in inane office chat, company Hawaiin shirt days or the occasional holiday potlucks in the lunchroom — I feel like I've got it made.
The forest lends itself to creative daydreams where clocks melt like a dripping candle stick, freezing in time until you're left with a moment like a pleasant sigh of gratitude. My daydreams or fantasies about the rain forest, I've noticed, differ with location. When me and the boys were laying transects on Gigante, a plethora of vines and fallen trees, rain pouring through the canopy, sopping wet socks and wrinkled fingers like prolonged bubble baths made me feel like a soldier of war, trampling through enemy territory, heavy gun in hand, heart on America. Here on BCI where greens can be pastel and fungus presents itself like a new color undiscovered by the rainbow, I feel more like I'm Zelda or a royal subject of the 16th century sneaking away from the castle to explore the secrets of the forest — only, the birds and monkeys don't speak to me. At least, they haven't yet. I hope they don't; it'd be very difficult to convince Mike I don't need psychological evaluation and the forest creatures really do converse with solo researchers in quiet moments — if you just … listen.
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June 4, 2006 at 4:19 pm (Matt Dowling)
Dinner on Isla Barro Colorado. Buffet style. The ability to eat as many as 5,ooo calories and or as few as 200. Anything goes. Dinner conversation on Barro Colorado. The ability to ingest 5, 000 'intellectual' calories or as few as 0. Dinner talk is cheap, but it can elevate your research to new heights, especially when the ideas you are gleaning during dinner are inspiring and beneficial. Is dinner on the island, with between 15 to 50 scientists in various career stages always like this: inspiring, deep, intellectual,…HEAVY? No way. For instance, one of the main topics of conversation (at least among the students on the island) last week was when we would have beer again on the island (we had run out three days before). Ah, beer. Nothing makes the dynamics of your research and social responsibilities more bearable than beer (thus the cause for concern at dinner for its eventual reappearance).
Contrast last week's beer chat with the one I was drawn into last night. The specter of intelligent design creationism looms on the minds of many in biology these days, and this is also true at remote places like tropical field stations in Panama. A new friend and fellow student Sonja and I began a conversation that lasted well after the end of dinner. Because we realized that significant challenges to the intergrity of American science education are being posed by those in the ID camp, we wanted to discuss further how we might play a role in combating the pseudoscientific wedges being thrown in the way of intellectual progress. Did the conversation have anything to do with my research? Not directly, though it does concern me indirectly. I can't imagine looking at the complexities of the rainforest on BCI and simply giving up the intellectual struggles to understand it by saying "it must have been designed that way". It was nice to talk to a fellow student about her opinions on the matter. It felt like, for an instant, we were drawing ourselves together and reestablishing what it is our small culture in biology believes. We believe in the scientific method and in "science as a way of knowing". We don't have all the answers and haven't explained everything yet (may it never be so!) however, we won't stop trying. We believe in the underlying unity of life on earth as explained by evolution via natural selection. It was nice to reaffirm this in a simple chat.
Am I intellectual? Sometimes. Did I participate in the 'where's the beer' chat? Of course, I started it. Man cannot live by bread alone…
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June 4, 2006 at 3:08 pm (Mike Kaspari)
Years ago, on a planet far, far, away, in a more innocent time, the AntLab found itself in Panama and tried to write about it. The quality of these scintillating posts was only exceeded by the brevity of the enterprise.
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June 3, 2006 at 2:44 am (Mike Kaspari)
One thing about living at a field station, your time is truly your own. Folks who work here on the island live in two very different ways. Some commute in daily from the sleepy town of Gamboa, down on the other end of Lake Gatun. These folks arrive promptly 8:00AM, trundling up the roads and steps, lugging field equipment, some still groggy from sleeping on the boat. They leave just as promptly at 3:30 when the blast of the horn signals the end of the work day. Gamboites thus live a comfortable commuter existence–but instead of opening a briefcase they swing a butterfly net or measure the number of bugs on leaves of various plants for their workaday existence. Home at 4:00PM means making dinner, shopping, going to a show.
The second way is to live and work at the field station, sleeping in the dormitories and eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the comedor. This to me is infinitely preferable, if only because one is free to work in the forest or the lab with the minimum distractions of domesticity crowding in. Its like summer camp for ecologists. Eating at the long tables, and gabbing about your work, the latest movies, and intriguing skin lesions is just part of the mix, and you don't have to do dishes. Laundry is still on your own, but many find ways to avoid that chore for lengths of time that would, in the more cultured world, seem a bit protracted. If I wanted to walk all night through the forest, looking for army ants I could. (I don't, but I could). And frankly, the notion of leaving the island at 3:30 just makes no sense. Especially when happy hour on the balcony, overlooking the lagoon, is just about the most splendiferous thing in the life of the island.
One consequence is the hours–one awakes with the sun at 6:00, and, without much of a break finds oneself in the lab after 9:00 (tho the institution of the power nap is very much in play here). And here we are sit, geeking at computers, plugged into Ipods, and/or separating litter ants from the twiggy homes into sleek new plastic condos. Another island resident stops by delivers cookies. We're all in this together.
Not a bad life. Even if the hours are a little on the longish side.
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June 2, 2006 at 9:36 pm (Risa Walters)
Hi, my name is Risa Walters and this is my first field season. Actually, this is the first time I've used a passport. I have a degree in screenwriting and experience in the entertainment business in Los Angeles, but I recently returned to college in my hometown to fulfill my interests in science. I am one of the new additions to Dr. Kaspari's antlab at the University of Oklahoma. My intentions are to eventually pursue a master's and/or PhD in zoology, subject undecided. So far, I am fascinated with fungal parasites and their effects on arthropods. This summer my goals are to learn as much about ecology and ants as I can, as well as absorb information about all the interesting subjects various researchers from all over the world are exploring.
One of the things I have learned about field work is the importance of using the senses for gathering information about litter samples I am collecting in an area. Just the smell of an area of the forest can tell you something about what aspects of the area are dominate. A rotten apple smell can be indicative of endophyte decomposition in leaves, and the chemicals millipedes secrete as a defense mechanism also have a very strong, specific scent.
Recently I was taught how to determine the possibility of ant colonies inside fallen vines, branches and twigs. The exterior of the sticks tend to be spongey and will sometimes flake in my hand. Finding an ant colony is like discovering a small secret of the forest, like hearing controversial gossip or discovering diamonds in a sand box. One of my goals this summer is to keep a colony of ants alive so I may observe their activities.
Currently, I am gathering isopods (pill bugs and sow bugs) and millipedes to discover what they like to eat. I'm sure you'll read more about it later this summer!
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June 1, 2006 at 1:52 am (Matt Dowling)
So much to see and understand here. This, the essence of my experience in the tropics, summarizes the feeling I get everyday when looking at the forest on Barro Colorado Island. My name is Matt Dowling and I'm an undergraduate at the University of Oklahoma currently working in Mike Kaspari's Antlab. I'm fascinated by the natural history of small, twig-dwelling ants that live in the leafy, moist litter on the forest floor here in the tropics. There is much still to learn about these ants. One thing that that is well understood is that the are extremely abundant. What do the ants do in the leaf litter? How do their everyday activities affect other soil arthropods living near them? Are they aggressive predators? What do they eat? How do they deal with the ephemeral nature of the the twig nests they inhabit? I think about these types of questions a lot. Why should organisms that average between 1-3mm in length become successful in so many ways? E.O. Wilson has called these types of organisms the "small things that run the world". In later posts I'd like to talk about just what it means to 'run the world' by affecting the trophic dynamics in the leaf litter. I'll describe the experiments I'm conducting this field season, and try to share some of the wonder that the forest on BCI inspires in me. Welcome to the Antlab in Panama!
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