The Happy Herper

Nilo is wild about ALL lizards, so he was naturally delighted by this jewel!

The Changling!

It's been a few days since we've posted any news because we are working on development of the image gallery pages for the official LCO website (as well as there being some serious grant writing underway!). Whilst I was watching some birds from the balcony of the house - that has to be one of THE best nature viewing spots on the whole Peninsula - Something in the bushes caught my eye. A dead leaf? A snake? Wait... it's a strangle looking lizard. Reinaldo came up from the lower garden and managed to lure the creature down from it's perch on the end of a long stick, and it turned out to be a truly gorgeous chameleon! After more than a decade of field work in the region, Reinaldo has never seen or heard of one of these creatures, and we suspect that they must be rather rare.

Butterfly - Eunica pomona pomona

A new record for Los Charcos, Eunica pomona pomona (NYMPHALINAE). Of all the plants we have on offer, this gorgeous black and electric blue winged butterfly came visiting a cardboard box!

Glorious morning!

A friend writes after reading the Los Charcos blog, "Too many snakes! I doubt I will ever step out of the balcony if I were there". And with a view like this, why would you want to? I took this photo of the mist filled valley at the foot of Cerro Rincon at 5am this morning.

Venomous or non-venomous?

Ok, here's a good opportunity to compare venomous and non-venomous snakes. The image on the lefthand side depicts a juvenille Terciopelo (Bothrops asper), this is a deadly venomous viper and, as you can see, the head scales are uniformly small and the head itself is distinctly arrow-shaped. The image on the righthand side is of a False Terciopelo (Xenodon rabdocephalus) a non-venomous snake, and as you can see, the scales infront and just behind the eyes are larger than the other scales on this snake's head. The head is rounder (although, many non-venomous snakes inflate their cheeks to look more viper-like). My advice to you is, respect all snakes. Never harrass them to perform. It's better to assume that a snake is venomous. And remember, even non-venomous snakes can bite, and many of these bites cause allergic reaction or infection.

False Terciopelo - Xenodon rabdocephalus

This afternoon, whilst clearing up the workshop, Reinaldo found this False Terciopelo (Xenodon rabdocephalus) under black plastic bag and clearly having had a good meal recently. It would be easy to be fooled by this non-venomous mimic, and when it inflates its cheeks it looks distinctly viperish. But in the False Terciopelo, the head scales are variable in size (both large and small). A true, deadly venomous, Terciopelo has consistently small scales on its head (all the same size). Infact that's how to distinguish between venemous and non-venomous snakes. But the rule is, don't get close enough to any snake to inspect the size of its head scales! Reinaldo nearly stepped on an adult Terciopelo (ca. 2 meters!) on a forest trail this morning, at around 9am. So they seem to be out and about now, with the onset of the rainy season.

Cyclanthus bipartitus

This series of images follows the progress of the opening of the inflorescence of Cyclanthus bipartitus (CYCLANTHACEAE). A clear demonstration of the advantages that a field botanist has when they live side-by-side with their study subjects. Image times, (from left to right): 6pm (7th May 2008), 9:30pm (7th May 2008), 7am (8th May 2008), 10am (8th May 2008). You'll be hard pushed to find images of this plant, nevermind fresh and in flower. These gorgeous ones were taken by Reinaldo. Of course! Cyclanthus bipartitus is one of my favorites in our native plants garden. Infact, the genera Asplundia, Carludovica, and Cyclanthus are all represented in the garden at this time and make very attractive regional ornamental species.