Even more pictures

Picture going up the hill to the village













The road














Now this is an A+ set up- all pannels taut, nice placement- flyway with brush around













House near the river we collected at the day we headed north and almost got to Mexico

Pictures from Guatemala

This is the hotel we stayed at the first night. It was in downtown Guatemala City, right next to the American Embasy. It had a bunch of random statutes in front of it. The best part was that it had wireless internet and TV.









This is the view driving down the street in Antiqua.













This is the second place we stopped to collect at on our trip. There were a ton of leafhoppers in this small patch of grass. The mountian in the background is a volcano that erupted periodically.









This was the first Malaise Trap that AMC and I put up. Note the use of leaves and vines to get it possitioned correctly. The trap wasn't quite an A+ but I figure we made up for it in creativity.
















The Computer store in one of the towns we drove through. You could tell what brands and products were sold inside a store by looking at what logos were painted on the walls such as Cannon, Intel, and HP in this case

Guatemala Day 3

We left the hotel a bit after 7am and drove northwest. We were heading up CA2 almost all the way to the Mexican boarder. I fell asleep pretty soon after leaving and didn’t wake up until we got to the town where we wre stoping for breakfast. We went to a chicken fastfood place but it was so packed in there we couldn’t find a place to sit so we went next door to burger king. I ordered bacon and orange juice in spansih with minimal help, not bad. It cost 10.25Q, so not even 2 bucks. Not bad. We ate and AMC decided she wanted a BK crown so JRJ got her one which she wore outside. On TV GWB was appointing a new head of the CIA or something, guess well find out what happened when we get back to the states. Next stop was the grocery store which strangely enough was inside a mall. On the way in we passed at least 6 different shoe stores including payless. This store was quite a bit larger and actually had a lot of food. I got peanut butter (jif), a can of spam, 2 apple juice and 2 mango orange juices both kenrs. I also got a pigma pen like I was using in dominica. All for a total of 82Q. We walked back to the truck when JRJ decided he needed to go to the restroom. So as usual we were standing around waiting on JRJ to get his act together. We headed off back down the road then stopped for gas at Esso aka Exxon, complete with a tigermart. It was a full service gas station so the attendant came out pumped our gas, cleaned the windows etc. It was my 1st experience with that since even in dominica you had to pump your own gas which was quite amusing to watch since neither JBW or Lacher could figure out how to open up the gas tank- how many phds does it take to pump gas? Then it was back on the road. I fell asleep again and woke up as we were coming up to our 1st collecting spot. It was a bridge off the highway over a large fast flowing river. The area was sandy but had a lot of trash. We jumped out and I started sweeping. Got some cool things considering how disturbed it was including some Flattids, cool looking membracids, and some new cicadellids. I chased down an ascilid also. Dave and jose found some ant lion pits and sifted out a few 3rd instars. We were all waiting on JRJ as usual who was off who knows where. Dave suggested we but a leash on him and take turns being the josh keeper. Back on the road we pulled off at a second bridge. This one was near a town and a bunch of people were bathing and doing laundry. The area was very disturbed but Dave got some good mayflies. I went and swept alittle but didn’t get anything of interest and only a couple leafhoppers at that. It was totally reminiscent of the little brazos as far as appearance, diversity, and set up. Strange. So AMC and I sat on the tailgate and drank juice (me) and boxochoclate milk (AMC) and talked about collecting methods. After a while everyone else was ready to go so we loaded back up into the truck and drove north. We went through a goodsize town looking for a place to buy pesticides for JRJs fogger. We couldn’t see anything (we were looking for buildings with syngenta or bayer logos) and jose figured itd be further down so we kept driving. The streets were packed with trycilce jeep deals called toktoks or something like that since that’s the brand. We eventually made it most of the way down the road with no luck. Jose stopped and asked someone walking down the street and he said it was just a few building down. Of course they were closed. So we asked someone else who pointed us to a pet shop so that was a no go. We kept heading out of town and found a place to collect near this huge fast river. We parked in someones dirt garden and climbed out. The dog on the roof of the house started barking at us and jose yelled something at the woman who appeared. Apparently we got permission and we started collecting. This site was really good for hoppers. Some cool looking membracids and a couple species of leafhopper I hadn’t collected yet. I also caught a green lacewing. After 30 min or so dave said we needed to get going so we all climbed back up to the truck. JRJ was of course nowhere to be seen so we got all our stuff loaded up and then he appeared saying hed found somemore pits and he needed a shovel. So he took AMCs trowel and went to dig some up. After a while he said he had enough and we headed back down the hill. There were tons of kids running around I think school had just gotten out. We got back on the main road and started going south a different way then we came. We went over a road that had gotten totally destroyed by a hurricane. It got washed out and the water must have been 10-20ft deep. It moved around some huge rocks also. Very impressive. We made it back to the road wed came in on and after a bit went through a town with a circus tent. As we drove past Jose spotted a chemical store and circled back around to check it out. It was mainly a feed store and as david pointed out contained pictures of happy dogs, cats, sheep, and chickens along with a pissed off looking cow. Jose and JRJ got out and bought the pesticide to try in the fogger. Sortly after that we stopped at a shell station to buy some snacks. I got AMC and I some peanut M&Ms. JRJ got some sugar covered peanuts then tried to explain them by saying the were like what you eat at Christmas which made all the rest of us deiced he was crazy. Then it was back in the truck where conversation rapidly degraded into making fun of josh for trying to tell us fables. AMCs like your boring and im not listening anymore. Dave started telling stories of things hed seen in the philipeans. We made it back to the hotel after dark- thered been a ton of traffic and some accidents along the way which made the going really slow. It also started raining toward the end and we had to get out and move our stuff into the cab. We got back to the hotel and honked to get let into the compound. There wasn’t a guard within hearing distance apparently so jose got out and got one to let us in. We stopped to see if the office was still open and luckily it was. We paid 82 US for 3 nites plus 3 meals. Not cheep but not too bad. I used up all my extra money on that so hopefully I can find someplace to get more money. Turns out they have internet in the office so I ran back to the room and got stuff ready to go pull traps and then went back to use the internet. Eventually it was my turn and I e-mailed grandpa, mom, and JAC. I told JAC about my morpho but not about the cool ant mimics since AMC and I decided to suprise him with those.Once we were done with the net AMC and I went back to the rooms and found jose to go pick up our traps. We told JRJ wed pick up his trap also. We had a good time driving up there talking about the differences in collecting styles. That’s been a big issue me and AMC like lots of stops short duration while JRJ and dave prefer staying in one spot for an extended period. This caused some headbutting for planning tomorrow since we could either go south and hit some new places or head east and go the the reserve right away. I really wanted to go south as did jose and AMC. JRJ never really said which he wanted and dave didn’t want to go south. We eventually decided to head south but make only 2 stops and try to get to the reserve by 3. Jose got the 1st 2 malasie traps along with JRJs fogging sheet which shockingly enough had virtually no bugs while AMC and I picked up pan traps. We got somemore ant mimic membracids and a good number of cicadellids. I think we left a couple traps out though since when it was all said and done I only counted 26 eventhough I though id put out 30. o well. It was rather amusing since AMC was just telling me she hated snakes after hearing a rustling noise she though was either a snake or a puma when jose showed up with a small snake. It was brown and grey with a faint pattern. Lookeds similar to a garder snake in body shape. AMC was rather amused. Back at the truck we were talking about how annoying the jars were to deal with and Jose said he uses woorl packs straight on the head. This makes a ton of sence and I think were going to give this a try. Next stop was the malaise trap set across the path by a stream a bit further up the road. This trap had a ton of bugs and was much easier to take down than putting it up had been, or maybe since I couldn’t see the fact I was hanging over the edge of the embankment I didn’t think about falling down into the stream. We then went all the way up to the top turned around and collected the one in the bamboo patch. It also had a pretty good sample for only being out 24 hrs or so. The final trap was the one set up along the embankment. There were only a couple bugs in this trap it was kinda an experimental placement and guess it needs some modification. We loaded everything into the truck and drove down to the rooms. The traps were a bit damp so the 3 of us hung them up on the porch to dry out. Jose went to bed and AMC and I ate dinner of tuna, crackers, and peanut butter. I also had a can of mango apple juice. We turned on some country and had a grand old time singing and feeding as Aubrey called dinner. Then it was time for bed.

Its interesting the differences between here and dominca. Dominica seems much poorer in many ways. Most of the houses there were really run down while these while not the suburbs or anything weren’t in horrible shape. Something that struck me in dominica was that when you were in Roseau there were people everywhere just sitting around not doing any actual work no matter what day or time it was. Here people seem poor but are all working. They are fairly well dressed in the towns and everyone has some form of shoes. Out in the country the workers are all wearing pretty dirty clothes but you go by the houses and everyone has wash hung up. Also the dogs are radically different . Dominica had few dogs and most of those were quite skinny and didn’t look too good coat wise. There are tons of dogs running around but most of them look to be in ok shape. Theyre not fat but theyre not skin and bones either in most cases. Ive only seen a couple mangy dogs also. Many are even identifiable breeds especially rotties and German Shepards. The roads are also in much better shape as are the cars. Most people here have trucks or suvs and many of them are in pretty good shape- still shiny and newish. A lot of them are diesel which is very cheap (18-19Q) vs regular gas (22-23Q). Ive learned a ton on this trip. Dominica was so easy as far as gear since as quartermaster of the expedition I could just assign people to bring any gear I wanted but couldn’t fit. This time I had 2 bags and that was all I had to deal with. Im learning what I actually need for how I collect which ive discovered is about the same stuff as I thought (exciting) but that as far a malaise traps go there are some spacesaving possibilities such as not using jars. AMC agreed that this was a great learning experience. I think it’s the only way to learn since collecting back in the states is a totally different ball game in many respects- you forget something you can find it at walmart. It also helps that I didn’t have woolley telling me everything to bring etc. I had to plan it out and figure out what I needed and what I could do without so I actually learned some.

Guatemala Day 2

We woke up pretty late today compared to normal. Breakfast was at 8 so I got up about 745. We were suppose to check the sheets at 2 and 5, but when the alarm went off at 2 I closed my eyes and instantly fell back asleep until 4 where I woke up and realized wed missed our target time. So we reset the alarm for 5 at which point we decided it was too cold and bright so went back to sleep. At breakfast jose said we didn’t miss anything at the sheet the moon never really set. O well, guess we made the right descion to get some descent sleep. Breakfast was pancakes (which david called waffles and so we told josh they were Guatemalan waffles and made him call them that for the rest of the meal), fruits, beans, and eggs. I had hot tea to drink. We decided to collect the highest area on the finca and then go back to where we set traps yesterday and work our way up the hill. We would then light trap up there and then come back for dinner at 8. Since we were going to be up their for so long jose suggested we not go up right away. That sounded good to everyone so we settled on 11 to head up. Aubrey and I organized out gear and I finished yesterdays report. Then we went out to the hammocks and I took a nap. I got bit up pretty bad by flies so I put on a flannel shirt and went back to sleep. Aubrey couldn’t take the flies anymore and got up and talked to josh who had just gotten back form taking some pictures. David and jose went to a stream and returned shortly before 11 saying there was absolutely nothing in the stream. We then loaded up and headed up the hill. AMC and I sat in the back this time and talked the whole way up about our plans for this semester. We both have decided we really need to learn Spanish and think the best way would be to make Carla and JBW talk to us every day so that way we can learn conversational spansih along with a more specific ento background. Well see if we can pull that off. Weve also decided that were going to try and stick to a daily schedule like Andy P. does, setting aside blocks of time to work on identifications, his bibliography, papers, etc. Well see how that goes. Part way up Jose stopped the truck and got out to point out a bird- a motmot- large and blue very cool. We saw a bunch of morphos on the way up too. Those leps are so cool. Then it was back to the road. A bit later we saw a falcon of some sort and JRJ got some pictures. AMC and I decided we really needed to take a group collecting trip of me, jac, amc, mika, eric, and frank or whichever of them wanted to come. Sort of a muskateer and et reuinion trip. I think it should be international- maybe panama since permits are manageable or even better austrilia. How cool would that be. I hope we do something like that. This trip has made me realize how much I miss having jac around. So often ive been like hed do this or hed really like this. Ive been trying to collect everything that t I think hed like and as strange as it sounds have been using his headlamp so atleast hes kinda here. Weird I know but ive really learned how much I depend on him. Even setting up the malaise traps I mean AMCs great and totally knows what to do, but JAC and I had it down to a science and could have a trap up in less than 10 min if we wanted to. I don’t know whats going to happen when he leaves for grad school, I might go crazy itd be like ½ of me is in Clemson. We got to the top of the road in about 50 min. There was a small village and we got out and looked around. There a bunch of black flies up there and they have river blindness so we totally soaked ourselves in DEET. There were some antlion pits but jrj didn’t have any luck with them. We headed down a trail into a canyon to the river and along the way met people walking back up to the river after washing clothes. One woman had all her laundry stuffed in a terracotta pot held to her back with a piece of cloth. There were also a bunch of kids running up and down including one with river blindness. You could look at him and the first thing you would notice what that his eyes looked wierd. We made it down to the place where theres a waterfall in the wet season and started collecting. Not a ton of leafhoppers but did get some new stuff. I also caught some leps including one with orange and purple wings. As AMC and I were getting ready to head up the trail a bit more I spotted a Morpho land way up on a rock. I climbed up as far as I could and jumped and netted the bug. It was sweet. I pinched it and put it in AMCs lep jar. JRJ had met one of the kids (actually the one with river blindness) and was talking to him about taking pictures and bugs. The boy followed us all up the trail. AMC and I stopped to sweep some veg and I caught a bunch of different leafhoppers I hadn’t gotten before. We then went further up and met back up with jose. JRJ had gone down with the boy to see where they wash clothes so the 3 of us started back up the trail. David was already up at the top and came back down to let us know all the kids wanted their pictures taken. Sure enough once we got to the top all the kids started yelling photo photo so we took a bunch of pictures. Once we were all loaded up we started back down and all the kids followed us trying to jump on the bumper. 4 of the older ones (a 12 yearold boy, the river blind kid, a young boy and girl) made it. The youngest boy hung off the truck dragging his feet while the rest perched on the bumper. The young girl jumped off after 5 min or so, followed by the young boy and river blind kid a couple min later. The 12 year old jumped off 15 min down the hill or so. After a bit we stopped and picked up a guy who was walking down the hill. He was better dressed than most of the people and had a pretty nice looking backpack. We dropped him off where the road we were on met the main road going down the mountain. We drove down to where the malaise traps were set and AMC and I checked everything. The 1st trap was very productive, the pan traps were collecting stuff including some ant mimic membracids. The 2nd trap however was really drooping and most of the alcohol was gone, so we tried to get it proped more upright in hopes of saving what alchol remained. We headed back up and ate our MREs- quite an adventure. Mine wasn’t bad they come with a small heater to warm the food, a snack (like peanut butter), a dessert, fruit drink mix, gum, and crackers. After we were done Jose, AMC and I headed up the hill to set the rest of the malaise traps. The 1st one we put across a path near a stream but quite a bit higher than it. We managed to find a spot where the trail was pretty high with an opening to the river the set up was a bit tricky since the trees we were tying into were overhangind the stream but we managed. Jose got the light sheet set up while we worked. We got done first so sat on a big rock in the stream until he got back. We then headed all the way up to where wed turned around the day before then worked our way back until we found another good set up. This one required some major habitat modification as I like to say and jose opened up a hole in the forest with his machete. Everyone down here carries them even the homeless people in town. Its kinda crazy. We got the trap set with joses help. It was a pretty nice looking trap with all sides out and taut. We kept driving down the mountain and found a place for the last trap. This one was along an embankment and we used sticks to tie onto on the grassy side. This trap also looked really good with all sides taut. When we were done we talked traps for a while- jose suggested using poles instead of rope since often its hard to find stuff to tie onto. I think im going to try this. He also suggested tying something dead onto the side to attrack calliphorids for JAC. I think were going to buy a dead fish for this purpose. JBWs going to freak out when I tell him what we tied onto his trap. Itll be great. We went back to the stream were jrj and david were. Jose stopped and caught some leps on the way down. He had envelopes so I stuck my morpho in one. We got back to the stream and he came and helped us fix the drooping trap. We wedged a stick under the head to keep it taut and refilled to head. Jose then started to look for some leps that had flown over while Aubrey and I went to look at the pan traps again. We found another membracid so now we have one for her and I along with JAC. I went and got somemore water and refilled the traps since they were getting kinda low. While doing this I heard a funny call and jose said it was a guan of some sort, then I heard the pitch change and moments later jose pointed at it flighing overhead- huge birds with stubby wings. It was totally black. It’s a pennelope. Then it was time to turn on the lights. JRJ was kinda upset we wernt collecting at that stream but I think the other one was much better as it was higher and more open. He tried fogging and caught a single psocid. There were apparently culicids flying in and out of the fog with no effect. We drove up and turned on the lights. There were some good bugs at the sheets including a bunch of new leafhoppers and my 1st flattid of the trip. At 730 we headed back down the hill for dinner. AMC and I were in the back of the truck again. She was commenting on the fact it was nice there were no huge predators like bears in guat. So I told her I though there were pumas which freaked her out a bit. Any noise after that was a puma coming to eat her and a squeaking noise became a puma whos tail wed runover and was now about to spring on us. It was defiantly funny. Supper was squash, chicken, and rice. As expected it was excellent. At dinner we heard all about the fogging and had a good laugh at jrjs expense then he told us all about mating in scorpean flies. After diner we tried fogging under the eves which worked a lot better so jose suggested some stronger pesticides. JRJ decided to try it out again along with a raid bomb tonight while amc and I light trapped with jose. David stayed back at the hotel. The collecting was great again. AMC swept some and then sifted through the veg at the light. She managed to catch an anole while she was at it. It jumped around between all of us before running away. We heard an owl also. When it was all said and done I filled a 15 cc vial about 2 inchs just of hoppers mostly cicadellids. I bet I got 30-40 sp today. I also got stung by a pomplid just before dinner. It flew into the light then flew off into the brush. I could still see it so asked AMC to get my net so I could catch it. I netted it on the 1st try and while transferring it totally got nailed on the finger. Since this was my 1st wasp sting (other than an ich last year) I was a bit concerned but didn’t seem to have much of a reaction. Jose gave me some benydrl cream and that brought the swelling down fast. We called it a night at about 1130 and we took everything down and headed down the road. JRJ decided to leave his fogging trap up and collect it bright and early before we leave at 7 for the Mexican boarder area. I’ve decided Id really like to some back here for longer and spend more time running more malaise traps and ypts. I love passive traps. I think im actually a closet hymenopterist since I like all their collecting methods.