Expedition Day (Dec. 11, 2019)
Hi Again,
Today was the day we went out and set up out trail cams to catch some of the wildlife that inhabit the area to check for species, population, times of day and etc. It was a nice hike today, we were joined by another group, Jessica and Nichole, as well as the Indigenous People (4). I love that they had joined us because it was a great learning experience learning from those who grew up here and practice their traditions and knowing the knowledge of their environment. They would stop us every so often to explain the uses of plants, if they were edible (which was my favorite part), animal trails, insects and the type of animals that possibly crossed by.
They really helped to know where we should deploy the trail cameras and helped with testing them as well so interacting as a team made me feel really good as getting to connect personally and professionally. They held a ceremony this morning where they prayed on us before we went out to the field, it made me feel really great this was done due to being similar to my navajo culture where we pray to the sun in that direction and the use of water and plant life to bless each person. It made me feel more confident and safe to go about the day and such a great experience for them to allow us to be a part of that service. We also go to share a culture night with them that consisted of getting a specific leaf and extracting the green leafy part off the leaf to get the fibers that allow to be made of bags.
Back to the trail cams, Juan and I had set up 16 trail cams today and some were provided by Jessica due to wanting to help us catch a Jaguar on the cam since it was done in that area 2 years ago. I was also excited not only to see small game trails but also big ones knowing there is also something bigger than a aguiti out there. Not that I don't want to see them but I would love to see something that may be rare or that I haven't seen yet like an armadillo, paca, cat, monkey and etc. Once again it is always nice to have such a great smart mentor like Juan because he carries so much knowledge and hearing his passion in knowing the forest/jungle you really take a lot in. Also his relationship with the indigenous people, researchers, public and students.
Juan went to pick up the trail cams this morning and checked data and found that we caught the aguiti and possum so we selected the Possum for our team name, I like it. Also, I didn't get to see the sunrise in the morning because I forgot I had to meet Juan at 530am to help him and unfortunately missed that too because I thought it was 545am and had just missed him. However., today was a successful day of placing all the cams and we have 4 more to put up tomorrow in the potential areas we marked on the GPS and flagged off. in 3 more days we will collect the cams and go over our data :)
Good Night.
Today was the day we went out and set up out trail cams to catch some of the wildlife that inhabit the area to check for species, population, times of day and etc. It was a nice hike today, we were joined by another group, Jessica and Nichole, as well as the Indigenous People (4). I love that they had joined us because it was a great learning experience learning from those who grew up here and practice their traditions and knowing the knowledge of their environment. They would stop us every so often to explain the uses of plants, if they were edible (which was my favorite part), animal trails, insects and the type of animals that possibly crossed by.
They really helped to know where we should deploy the trail cameras and helped with testing them as well so interacting as a team made me feel really good as getting to connect personally and professionally. They held a ceremony this morning where they prayed on us before we went out to the field, it made me feel really great this was done due to being similar to my navajo culture where we pray to the sun in that direction and the use of water and plant life to bless each person. It made me feel more confident and safe to go about the day and such a great experience for them to allow us to be a part of that service. We also go to share a culture night with them that consisted of getting a specific leaf and extracting the green leafy part off the leaf to get the fibers that allow to be made of bags.
Back to the trail cams, Juan and I had set up 16 trail cams today and some were provided by Jessica due to wanting to help us catch a Jaguar on the cam since it was done in that area 2 years ago. I was also excited not only to see small game trails but also big ones knowing there is also something bigger than a aguiti out there. Not that I don't want to see them but I would love to see something that may be rare or that I haven't seen yet like an armadillo, paca, cat, monkey and etc. Once again it is always nice to have such a great smart mentor like Juan because he carries so much knowledge and hearing his passion in knowing the forest/jungle you really take a lot in. Also his relationship with the indigenous people, researchers, public and students.
Juan went to pick up the trail cams this morning and checked data and found that we caught the aguiti and possum so we selected the Possum for our team name, I like it. Also, I didn't get to see the sunrise in the morning because I forgot I had to meet Juan at 530am to help him and unfortunately missed that too because I thought it was 545am and had just missed him. However., today was a successful day of placing all the cams and we have 4 more to put up tomorrow in the potential areas we marked on the GPS and flagged off. in 3 more days we will collect the cams and go over our data :)
Good Night.
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