The Monkey Matters Blog

It’s amazing how, after a day in one of the most wild places that I have ever spent time in, covered in rainforest gunk and fresh bug bites, I find myself ten minutes later basking in air conditioning and enjoying the benefits of electricity and a wireless connection. The ten minutes, of course, included a lightning-quick shower (quick not by preference, but because of the frighteningly cold water). It’s a little strange writing following such a sudden and dramatic change, but I’ll gladly take that challenge.

Here’s a brief overview of events leading to the present.

After arriving in Quito late Thursday night, I headed right back to the airport in the morning and met up with Diego, co-manager of Tiputini, and a few student groups. We took a small plane to Coca (30-40 minutes), then took a motorboat down the Napo River to an oil company checkpoint (a little hut with an x-ray scanner, not unlike that at an airport). After loading up our bags, we took a vehicle (an odd truck/trolley hybrid) to the Tiputini River, where another motorboat was waiting. The trip down the Tiputini River was a good one. We saw several large birds, capybaras (the world’s largest rodent), pink river dolphins, and red brocket deer. The deer seemed to be harboring a broken leg (hence the closeness of the shot below). After allowing Diego to touch it, the deer swam away awkwardly and unfortunately will probably become easy prey for a large carnivore. After about an hour and a half, the rain hit and didn’t seem to end for most of the night. I used a few garbage bags to protect my luggage and the equipment inside but had nothing to cover myself and, after a few minutes, had to give up trying to duck from the rain. I got soaked. Here are some photos from the boat ride.

View of Tiputini River

Turtle and flycatcher

Anhinga

Red brocket deer

Today, I spent the morning tracking woolly monkeys. Five minutes into my hike, while I was preoccupied with watching the canopy, I walked right into a spiderweb (a thick one too), felt it envelop my head, and spent the next minute jumping around, picking the threads out of my hair, and fighting off the spider that I had angered in the process. I can’t think of a better welcome to the rainforest. With that spirit in mind, I decided to start a new blog feature: “Things I don’t miss (but had forgotten about).”

Things I don’t miss (but had forgotten about): Spiderwebs.

For the most part, they are tolerable. Most spiderwebs are small and will either get caught in our clothing/headwear or can be casually peeled off the skin but larger spiderwebs can be enormous, easily covering the width of a trail. Careful hikers avoid these. With my head often turned to the canopy, however, I find myself constantly running into these and feeling each individual thread as the spiderweb wraps around my face. It’s not so much the feeling of the web that bothers me; instead, I get freaked out by my not knowing which spider I had just annoyed. Is it large? poisonous? Are there many (some spiders are social)? I don’t generally consider myself afraid of bugs, including spiders (I’ve been bitten by plenty now), but that moment of not knowing continues to haunt me.

All of that aside, it is truly amazing to be back in the forest. Today was a “half day” (half in the field, half in the lab); but sitting around the lab has me itching to get out again. Halfway through this blog post, a troop of squirrel monkeys waltzed right past the lab and some stayed still just long enough for me to grab my camera and snap some photos. I’ll conclude this post with those pictures.

Around this time last year, I remember being shocked at how I was expected to pass two months living out of a carry-on sized suitcase. There are, however, several reasons for packing light as a primatologist (or any tropical field biologist). First, fewer items amount to fewer things to keep track of.  Second, everything we bring we can reasonably assume will return either dirty or damaged (no nice clothing or expensive electronics). Third, poor personal hygiene is perfectly acceptable (you deserve to be laughed at if you bring deodorant).

All this, of course, is a little disingenuous as I am traveling to one of the cushiest, most luxurious field stations that you can ever realistically expect to visit in the middle of the rainforest. The excellent station staff (the Tigres) prepare all of our meals and do all of our laundry, even changing our sheets and towels twice a week. I therefore need only to plan for four days or so of clothing. All this makes me wonder whether I’ll ever be ready for real fieldwork . . .

That being said, here are my steps for packing like a primatologist.

Step 1: Line the bottom of the suitcase with clothes. If you don’t already know, rolling up clothing is the most effective way to pack efficiently (it’s true, see NYTimes article). Here I have four sets of shirts, four sets of pants, and seven or so t-shirts. I alternated between only two sets of pants/shirts last year, which turned out quite unpleasant after a while–there is just no way to dry out a wet, sticky, moldy shirt in one of the most humid areas of the world (and no way to enjoy putting it on day after day). I also stuck in a pair of flip-flops (the primary means of transport around camp).

Step 2: Add an assortment of field equipment. Here I have a box of nails (which I’m carrying for my undergrad advisor), a GPS (also his), a new radio receiver (also his), a compass, batteries and chargers, falcon tubes filled with RNA later, poop tubes, and a water bottle stuffed with goodies (my razor, swiss army knife, Leatherman, a nail clipper, etc.).

Step 3: Repeat with a new layer of stuff. Here I have my binoculars (an unusually large pair), more batteries, toiletries, insoles, an umbrella (raincoats can be smelly), a bandana, and pajamas (nearly forgot them). The top pocket I stuffed with boxers and socks. I developed somewhat of an obsession the past few years with Smartwool brand socks, which manage to stay dry and comfortable even in the middle of the rainforest. There are four pairs packed away up there, along with two pairs of Wigwam socks, which I will scientifically test to see if they measure up to Smartwool. This curiosity arose after a conversation last year with Luca, a grad student at NYU, who made me feel so ashamed after buying a pair of Wigwams that I returned them to the store the next day. Screw you Luca.

Step 4: Finally, close the suitcase! Mine did so with plenty of room to spare. Along with the backpack on top (for my laptop, camera, and a book), and a set of casual clothes that I will wear tomorrow, that concludes my packing for the night. I have yet to pick a book to bring. Last year, I unwisely forgot to bring one (excluding a GRE book that I never opened) and instead bought The Story of Sushi in Quito at a rather expensive price, then had to endure two months of reading and learning all there is to know about a food that I couldn’t eat.

For at least the next two weeks, I will be tracking woolly monkeys, checking to make sure the radio collars on some of them are functioning, and collecting lots and lots of poop. Poop, by the way, is immensely valuable for primatologists, who use it for anything from DNA to hormone to diet analysis. Imagine itching to collect a sample from an animal high in the canopy, preferably without affecting its behavior. It is a pretty helpless feeling, but luckily, animals occasionally grant us that perfect sample, directly onto the rainforest floor! It really is quite fortunate that animals do it. Finding poop is an art that took me two months to perfect last year–I’m hoping now that I haven’t lost my eye, ear, and nose for it.

Before I sign off and go to bed, here is what woolly monkeys look like (from my home in New Jersey, this is the best I could do). Next post will be from Ecuador and may even have pictures of real woollies!

As it turns out, I will be working in the field this summer! The field site is the same as last summer: Tiputini Biodiversity Station, Ecuador, on the western edge of the Amazon Basin. It is a gorgeous site, encompassing some of the greatest biodiversity of plant and animal species in the world. It is also moderately remote. Here is rough overview of the trip. To reach Tiputini from the town of Puerto Francisco de Orellana, also known as Coca, you begin by taking a two-hour trip down the Napo River, a tributary of the Amazon River, until you reach the fringes of a territory owned by an oil company operating in the rainforest. After making your way through security (alcohol, by the way, does not make it past this point), you take a two-hour bus ride to the Tiputini River and another two-hour canoe ride down the Tiputini River to reach the station. The canoe ride is an absolutely mind-numbingly exhilarating experience. The remoteness of the area begins to kick in a bit (at this point, you surely have the entire river to yourself), you begin to see the mostly untouched beauty of the forest around Tiputini, and there are some incredible animals around (including your best-ever shot of seeing a jaguar). Anyway, all this remoteness means virtually no hunting or habitat fragmentation for the monkeys that we work with (I had a feeling that all that was going somewhere).

My job description this summer isn’t completely clear, but I will most likely be working with either titi or woolly monkeys (two of the ten monkey species there). I planned my visit to more or less coincide with my current advisor’s (Tony Di Fiore) stay, so I will be carrying out whatever duties he wants me to. My stay in Tiputini will last about a month starting May 20. Absolutely thrilled to be returning.