Ok this news is actually two days old, the internet is so slow I couldn't get it to post until now. I have an exciting update from today though, because Liz and I were scarily close to being trampled by peccaries today! Twice! In totally different parts of the forest. The pigs stink and you can smell them a long time before you see them. If they hear or see you, and are afraid, they tend to just run in any direction, potentially stampeding you. We were literally perched up in some big lianas at one point because they sounded so close, and they were so noisy there could have been dozens of them. I only say one all day, when it came onto the path, which is lucky I suppose since it's pretty rare to see them. It made for an exciting morning… anyway, end of update :)

I have a free day today after two 10+ hour days following tamarins. Following the monkeys is really hard work because you basically are stumbling and tripping through the dense understory while trying to keep up with the graceful monkeys jumping around above you. The monkeys have no trouble getting away from you if they get annoyed at the loud pesky humans following them either. My first morning of following, I witnessed an impressive stand off between three groups of tamarins over a favorite feeding tree of theirs, which is called an anona (the fruits are very yummy for humans too.) Two groups of emperor tamarins (emps) and a group of saddleback tamarins (fuscis) were all spaced around this tree, trilling and chatting to each other. It's pretty funny to watch the tamarins try to sound threatening, since they sound like songbirds whatever they do. The group of emps we weren't actually following all tried to sneak to the anona by jumping to the ground on the other side of this little ditch and sneaking into the trees on the other side from the others. The group I was watching with another assistant, Liz, was very wimpy and let a smaller group chase them from the anona.

While following the groups, the goal is to stay with them all day, recording interesting happenings and taking behavioral scans of the group every 10 minutes. It's pretty amazing to know what the group does from the time they get up until they pick a sleeping tree and settle down for the night at around 4:30. However, it's easy to get jealous of the tamarins just napping and eating all day while you're using all your energy to keep up with them! Some of the forest is really pleasant to follow the groups through, particularly the areas with big trees not much in the understory. There is this one place near the camp nicknamed The Inferno, which I haven't been to yet, but it's filled with large bamboo that has these awful, huge spines and is a huge pain if you have to follow monkeys through it. I have a new pastime though, which is popping the small (thorn-less) bamboo, which are filled with water. It's a good way to pass the time while the tamarins are napping. The bugs aren't as bad as I thought they might be, at least not the flying ones. This may be because I've taken the position that there's no such thing as too much DEET. Ants are everywhere though, and watching out for them is probably one of the most exhausting things about being in the forest!

I hiked this morning with another field assistant, Mike, to learn the trails around camp and see some more of the monkeys that live here. We walked up on a large group of capuchin monkeys having a feast on these sweet orange fruits right above the trail. I got a good picture of one hanging just by its tail and feeding on some insects. A large group of about 30 squirrel monkeys soon joined them. Just a few minutes later, we saw about four spider monkeys up ahead! The spider monkeys are much larger than the other monkeys I've seen so far, and they're the only monkey here that brachiates so it was really awesome to see them swinging through the trees with their super long arms. They would pause to stare at us every few seconds, then decided to head in the opposite direction. Funny that our little tamarins with sit on branches right above our heads, but these big spider monkeys, who we couldn't keep up with if we tried, won't even get close.

The other day, during a follow I was standing in the forest with Ines, who's a vet from Peru, and we were watching two groups of tamarins, a group of saki monkeys, titi monkeys, and we could hear howler monkeys in the background. It was amazing, and this area is just a random spot in the forest, it's not like they regularly bait for monkeys here - there are just a lot of them!! It's incredible to be living in a place where I can just go for a walk and see monkeys every day - I already know it's going to be hard to leave :)

Other sightings: nun birds, a bright green lizard with a pig-like nose, bats that live behind my cabin, blue morpho butterflies, an agouti (these look like huge mice but move kind of like rabbits), 4 trumpeter birds, army ants, HUGE trees with fan-shaped bases, a huge tree that tons of bats live in (You can hear them squeaking - I want to wait by the tree one evening and watch them swarm out), peccaries!!!