Galapagos Update

Blogging is still harder than I thought it was. There's photos to edit, sentences to create, internet to have, etc, to be able to write a blog post. It's challenging in the Galapagos!

Last week I was able to wake up before dawn and go birding. I was super eager and excited to see the diversity of birds present in the early morning. I took way too many photos that will take forever for me to sort through and edit, but eventually I'll upload them and share the magic of birding during a Galapagueñan sunrise with you.

I saw blue-footed boobies plunge diving and it was super exciting, but very difficult to actually photograph. They start up decently high in the sky and then accelerate really quickly towards the ocean. With more time observing, I bet I can figure out when they're starting the dive to get better photos. I went into a lighthouse and a frigate bird landed right above my head! I was able to get a few shots of it, but its curved bill was intimidating and it was almost time for breakfast. I also saw a beautiful yellow warbler signing from a tree branch before I left to go eat. It was a really fun and beautiful morning; I'll definitely wake up early and go out again.

In class, I decided to work on a phylogeny of flycatchers. Initially, I wanted to find a species or two that are distributed across both North and South America and compare diversity and origins. Due to time constraints, that wasn't possible. I instead chose to examine the genus Myiarchus, which includes two species in North America and the Galapagos Flycatcher.

Whenever a researcher uses DNA sequences in a paper, they must be added to the free, public, online database called GenBank. I got samples of mitochondrial genes from 100 different myiarchines. My initial results show that some of the species are paraphyletic, meaning that they do not share a common ancestor and should be reevaluated as separate species. Additional results indicate that my computer is kind of old and needs more processing power and RAM to run phylogenetic analyses.

After I finish my final analyses and write a paper about my research, I get to go on an island hopping tour! It's only a week long, but the vacation will be really nice. I'm thrilled that I get to go to Bartolome again! That was one of my favorite islands the last time I was in the Galapagos, and I can't wait to be back there with the penguins and beautiful scenery. We also get to go to Santa Cruz and Isabela, but nowhere else. Hopefully they pack a lot of fun adventures (with birds) into the vacation; then again, I'm on the Galapagos, so I don't really see how they won't. Sadly, though, me going island hopping means that I probably won't update my blog for at least a week and that I'll be even more behind in photos. But I appreciate the patience of all of my readers :].