Tower Climb

This morning we geared up in preparation for a tower climb.

 This is the tower, 40 meters high, designed to allow researchers to climb up into the canopy layers of the rainforest for further study.

 And so we climbed, and climbed, crossing a bridge so that we could climb some more.

 

The view from the top was well worth the climbing.  

 

Especially after we spotted this sloth.  

We spent the rest of the morning hiking around checking on our traps again.  We are really starting to get our system down.  We also took some time to stop along the way and gather some photos and videos to use in class.  It wasn't raining at all which made it a wonderful opportunity.  It was still muddy though, our boots looked like this by the time we were done.  

Then after a shower and some lunch, we settled in on the patio outside the cafeteria to finish uploading camera trap photos and entering our data.  While we sat working we were visited by this Howler Monkey who was hanging out chilling in a nearby tree.  We made good progress with our data.  Armadillos, agouti, and perhaps a skunk were all added to our list of camera trap photos.  No cats last night, but we are getting a nice variety.

We went back out to the classroom again before dinner for some more lesson plan ideas.  After dinner we returned for a talk on the TEAM site in Rwanda with beautiful photos of the critically endangered Mountain Gorilla.  Finally, we rounded out the evening with a movie called "The Big Year"  with Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson.  It was a sweet movie about birding that we could all appreciate especially now in the midst of so much bird activity.  Speaking of birds, check out the Blue Grey Tanager who came to visit us right before the Howler Monkey.  Another busy day in the rainforest.  We are just about at the halfway point now.