Leaping Lizards!

The lizards were caught in the Chiricahua National Monument because they are so densely populated.   Walking down the trails you see them on the rocks every few minutes.  When they were caught they location was written down in GPS coordinates and if their location was notable (“up on rocks” or “on fallen tree to the left”).  We dropped off all of the lizards we brought with us and then headed back to New Mexico to see the Carlsbad Caverns.  The quickest way to make that 7 hour (or more) drive is to dip down into Texas and then back up into New Mexico.  We traveled past boarder patrol vehicles and stops. 

The Chiricahua National Monument is an impressive collection of pinnacles, columns and balancing rocks.  They scatter the mountain sides and paths dwarfing everything and anyone that comes to admire the natural wonder.  The mountain range is the inactive volcano range that is twenty miles wide and forty miles long.  Violent geological activity  millions of years ago have left the impressive rock formations.  Most of the land is considered wilderness, it has no trails or roads through it so that it is left untouched.  The CCC, the Civilian Conservation Corps, built the trails that wind through the peaks.

*I will post pictures later but the site is not loading them right now*

It has been a while since I posted but it has been a busy last week.  We finished up the first half of the experiment.  We conducted surgery on the 27 lizards that had been part of the experiment so far to remove the micro-data loggers and download the data.  These loggers monitored their temperature for 35 days.  Post-surgery all of the lizards are going to be released where they were caught.  We just got back from our trip to return most of the lizards, all of the ones that had enough recovery time since surgery to be released this week.  We drove to Arizona where they were caught, camped and released them.  Since we don’t start field work with the second half of the lizards until Tuesday we did some traveling.  I will post a bunch of entries with pictures and information about the locations we visited. 

As we approach monsoon season here in New Mexico, the tarantulas are becoming more active and we have to check the enclosures for them every morning before we start.  The tarantulas won’t eat the lizards but they are capable of biting them. 

I had been here for over a week and still hadn’t seen any snakes.  Don’t get me wrong but I didn’t really mind that fact (not a huge fan).  They are really cool animals butI would rather not come in close contact with them. 

So this little buddy was sitting outside our house aftere it rained all night.  They come out after it rains to places where they normally don’t go.  I made good use of my zoom as opposed to getting so close that it felt it needed to use its rattle, like  some of the people I live with.  I will be posting more pictures tomorrow I hope….

Yesterday while we were in the field monitoring the lizards, there was this amazing rainbow that circled the sun!!! This was something I had never seen before.  The desert is so gorgeous!

So the last few days have fallen into a nice routine.  We get up before 6 to have breakfast and get ready (pack snacks and multiple water bottles).  We drive to the field site, which takes almost thirty minutes because we have to drive around the ridge even though the site is about a mile hike.  Once all of the patches of shade are in the enclosures, about 7:30, we start monitoring the locations of each of the lizards in their enclosures by marking down the X and Y.  Some of the lizards are very active, trying to find the body temperature that they are looking for and other are much more stationary. 

It will be interesting to see if these patterns are noticeable in the other sets of lizards (we currently have 3 groups of 9 that are implanted with temperature sensors. 

I am excited to see how the rest of the summer goes and might get to Santa Fe this weekend on a day trip!

Today is day three in New Mexico!! The last two days were spent securing shade cloth above the enclosures that the experiment will be taking place in.  There are nine 20 meter by 20 meter enclosures that have a series of cables crisscrossed above them.  Mesh shade cloth of varying weaves are secured so that there are enclosures with one large patch of shade, 4 medium patches and 16 small patches.  The varying arrangements of the shade patches adds up to be the same amount of shade for each enclosure.  This constant makes it so that conclusions can be drawn as to whether a certain patch structure enables more accurate thermoregulation for the lizards.  Some of the enclosures have additional cloth covering the entire enclosure so that the lizards are never exposed to the direct sunlight.  These enclosures provide a cooler environment to compare the full sun enclosures to. 

Now that the enclosures are erected, the experiment can begin.  Last night we placed the first set of lizards in the enclosures, one each.  This morning we monitored their movement from 8am until about 1pm.  It is surprisingly difficult to find a lizard when staring at a 20 x20 meter enclosure (I am pretty sure there is a learning curve for spotting them quicker)  Around one there were some impressive clouds moving in and since the experiment relies on the shade clothe to be casting a shadow, without the sun the experiment can not continue. 

The weather here in the desert has been the most surprising part of the experience.  Being form the east coast, I am not used to being able to look out the window and see for miles.  Out here you can quite literally see the weather coming.  This is nice since you can tell when to wrap things up as opposed to getting caught in a storm of guard.  Attached are some beautiful pictures of the surrounding area, the weather and the land around the field site!!! I hope you enjoy them like I do!!!!!! (the last one has a rainbow!!)

The summer is here and ever since finals at Haverford concluded, I have been checking my packing list over and over trying to make sure that I have the essentials for life and research in the desert.  I am excited to be living in the desert and getting my hands dirty performing field work.  I will be working for Michael Sears, who was a professor at the Southern Illinois University and is the new Ecology professor at Bryn Mawr College, and his collaborator Michael Angilletta of Indiana State University.  The research that I will be conducting is related to ongoing experimental mesocosm studies of behavioral thermoregulation in lizards.  This research is being performed at the Sevilleta Long Term Ecological Research field station in New Mexico, about 60 miles south of Albuquerque.  I have been to Arizona for a short vacation years ago but that can not compare to living and working in the desert for 10 weeks!!!  All in all, I am really excited to get out to New Mexico and start my summer, even though I am bound to experience the hottest summer of my life, I am excited to see what summer is like without humidity!!!

Rising Biology senior Monica Stegman is going to spend the summer on a field project in New Mexico working with Bryn Mawr’s new ecologist studying temperature regulation in lizards. Following this, she will is also going to spend the fall semester in the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) program at at Woods’ Hole.