Panama Travel Journal - Day 4

By Bob Chastain Monday 9:00 am – It’s pouring rain. The BIG drops. The type you would get absolutely soaked in, in the 20 seconds it takes to run to your car from the supermarket. People were up between 6:00 and 8:00 am this morning. It started raining at about 6:00 am and poor Roberto finally gave up and came in to the porch on the house. Everyone is restless and drinking coffee or tea and eating oatmeal or granola bars. There is not much to do right now but fiddle with gear, talk idle chat and write.


Bob makes walking sticks

Later Monday - We did finally go out to search for frogs from 5:00 to 10:00 pm tonight. I know you would like to hear about the first catch and how exciting it was, but the fact is it wasn’t. We were still spinning from the trip in yesterday, figuring out the rain and trying to get our bearings. The first frog was found not twenty steps from camp on the way to the creek. So were the next several. Only one of them was a target species.

Before our trip tonight, Roberto gave us the plan. There is a prioritized list that was a collaboration of many people but was spearheaded by the Amphibian Ark Project. This list looks at many factors and then rates a frog on the priority list. If you are a frog you make the list, basically, by being very rare and dying easily from chytrid. The scientist in the group would butcher me for that statement, but it is the boiled-down version of the truth. The thinking is 20 to 25 males and 20 to 25 females will make a genetically diverse assurance population.


atelopus limosus

Our number one priority is how to safeguard these frogs. From that, number one on our list is to secure a population of Atelopus limosus. This relative of the Panamanian Golden Frog is only found in three known populations in a central to eastern Panama. It has proved that it is highly susceptible to the fungus and its relative, the Golden Frog, is functionally extinct in the wild. Oddly enough, the first collected frog was indeed Atelopus limosus. We found several species tonight, but it looks as if our next few days we will focus on two species from our target list that seem to be in enough abundance to get a decent start on our collection. Atelopus is found during the day, so we will search from 10:00 am to 4:00 or 5:00 pm for them and then spend our nights looking for Hyloscirtus colymba.


hyloscirtus colymba
Now I know you wish there were easier common names for these frogs, but you will have to get over it, just as we did. Our group did start referring to them as limosus and colymba though. There, that is all you are going to get to make it easier for you. By about 9:00 pm we were ready to head back and try to get some sleep. Tomorrow, Tuesday, we will start the first real full day of searching.