Tag Archives: Landscape
Plant species presence/absence transect
I assisted Rafa in conducting a transect to identify plant species presence/absence the other day. I discovered that I don’t know the grasses (Poaceae) well, but most of the other macrophyte species, I’ve got down. I was also reminded that it’s generally a bad idea to have electronics in the wetland here around 3 pm, as that’s when the rains usually come. Luckily, it’s easy to see and hear the rain coming.
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Tha wata’ comin’
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As I stated before, it’s quite easy to see the rain coming (here and here and here and here too). Huge sheets of rain cloud views of the distance mountains and hills. Although I wasn’t able to photograph it because I quickly shoved my camera in a dry bag, the sheets climbed and draped over the mountain to the right and headed straight for me. They were so heavy, not only was it impossible to see the mountain, but it was difficult to make out a birding tower about 100 m away.
Additionally, I’ve been taking a number of panoramas in the field and quickly stitching the photographs together using Microsoft ICE. They make amazing backgrounds for the new wide-screen displays that are standard on today’s laptops and desktops!
Trail to Bocana
With an f-stop of 1.8, I can start to get some photographs in the understory without the picture turning out completely blurry. It would have been nice to have this lens on the Osa trip last winter, where a dense canopy inhibited my ability to photograph the trail. Here, in Palo Verde, a fast lens isn’t quite a necessary, because the canopy is less dense and it’s always sunny.
Bird tower panorama
I love the clouds.
Catalina and Bocana
| Sean, a student who received funding to examine bill color in foraging birds from Ohio-Wesleyan University, and I made our way to Bocana and watched a crocodile swim pass (not pictured). |  |
Catalina wetland
The wetland plant composition is slightly different in Catalina. Pistia seems to dominate many open water areas, rather than Eichhornia and there are large patches of Lemna (pictured below) in some parts. Of course, the dominate emergent is Typha, but there is some Thalia. The Typha seems much more dominate this year than last, but I’m not sure if the wetland is managed similar to the wetland in the Palo Verde sector. Margins of the wetland have lots of Parkinsonia.
Rio Tempisque
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From the Top
