El
segundo día, en STRI 5, Septiembre 2017
Somehow I’ve lucked into the opportunity to join the Tropical
Marine Biology in Panama course for a week to prep for co-teaching the course in
the future. So here I am, getting to tag along on one snorkeling adventure
after another at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Bocas del Toro. After an evening of viewing terrestrial
wildlife (two-toed sloths, leaf cutter ants, and a herd of turtles), we started this
morning with three snorkeling excursions. First, we headed to STRI Point aboard
the Scarus (one of the STRI boats) to
check out a patch reef, turtle grass beds and red mangroves. Faunal highlights included huge sea cucumbers,
sea biscuits, and a small school of squid.
The 2017 Tropical Marine Biology in Panama class aboard the Scarus
Sea cucumber, Holothuria mexicana, found in seagrass beds
We
then headed to Hospital Pt. on a nearby island, Solarte. This was an
incredible coral and rock reef that led to a steep drop off at the point. There
was a large diversity of hard and soft corals at this site ranging from expansive
lettuce and brain corals to a tiny purple hydrocoral to sea fans and sea whips.
Faunal highlights included a large porcupine fish, a live cowry (the first live
one I’ve seen!), two moray eels, and large mats of zoanthids (animals that look
like coral colonies without the hard skeleton).
Richard holding a live cowry (a marine snail)
A butterfly fish passing by zoanthids (brown) and a sea whip (grey)
A green morray eel peaking out of the rock
A large sea fan (gorgonian)
Last,
we motored to Mangrove Pt. to view the animals living on red mangrove tap
roots. Faunal highlights included the huge diversity of colorful sponges living
on the mangrove roots and some crazy egg masses (likely made by a polychaete worm) that look like large
clear balloons coming out of sand burrows.
Red mangrove tap roots with a diversity of sponges and the green alga Caulerpa
One really excited invert nerd
Sadly, tomorrow will be my last day in Panama. I’ve had an incredible
time and learned much in my two, too short days at STRI. Thank you to Richard,
Jan and the UO students. I can’t wait
until we return in 2019!
Buenas noches,
Maya
No comments:
Post a Comment