Tuesday - Fungus Gardens and Cloud Forest Zip-Lining





Tuesday 5/28/19 we had delicious eggs with yogurt, then we went on nature hike to scout out different ant colonies. we were learning how to distinguish atta ants from acroymierimex ants, and how they differ with their house design and their head shape. After hiking for about an hour, and learnin how to dig up both kinds of ant colonies, we started to dig up the fungus gardens for ourselves then taking it back to the lab.


I was in the group Costa Rica Fam, and we dug up an atta ant colony. We took the fungus garden with the queen and we contained it for later studies. I dug all the way to the fungus garden but you have to do it in a very special way. First you have to start digging next to the ant colony because you will collapse the tunnels if you dug it from the top. After I found the tunnel from the side I carefully scraped the dirt all the way to the fungus garden to extract it.
-Kieran Heintz


I was in the JagRocks group and we dug up a small and immature Atta colony. We first dug a large hole about a foot away from the tunnel of the ant colony. After continuing to dig and not finding the tunnel we dug closer to the tunnel, carefully so we didn't destroy the fungus garden. Once we found the garden we had to clean our spoon using alcohol and fire. Without contaminating the spoon, we gently scooped under the a garden and shook the garden free from the dirt. We placed the garden into a clean container, labeled it and transported back to the lab. We found the queen within only digging up one colony because the colony was so small. Also, the ants were so immature that the pinchers didn't hurt.
-Ella Teeley

After lunch we split into 2 groups, half went zip lining and the other half went to a butterfly reserve. the zip lining was very fun because we zipped through the jungle; you could even hear howler monkeys in the background. first, we hiked a beautiful trail to the top of the zip lines. there was 7 zip lines each ending at a platform above the jungle. the last one was the best and longest zip.

We also went to the the butterfly habitat to see how the women in Costa Rica are trying to make a living. This is a recent project in order to help support the community. The ladies were given some of public land in order to start their butterfly garden. They have a building where they study and grow the caterpillars. The women and scientists are looking for similar bacteria resistance in the caterpillars that are produced by the ants. They allow the caterpillars to grow and then once the caterpillar makes a chrysalis it is placed into a garden until it emerges and becomes a beautiful butterfly.

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