To A Place Unknown: 4.July.2016 (Day 29)

bon voyage

I’ve mentioned it several times before but it bears repeating, my work-life balance abilities are garbage. Without my family here to keep me somewhat in check it’s even worse. The last month has been a whirlwind of excitement, data collection, and cool new animals.

But I’m getting a little exhausted.

I'm in the middle of another good news, bad news situation.

Bad news: although I submitted my permits ~4 months ago, I still have yet to get approval to bring cane toads from Queensland into the NT to conduct my dehydration experiments.

Good news: that means I just have to fly to Queensland and conduct the entire experiment there.

Since most of my toad experiment consists of sticking toads into containers without water for 4-5 days, I should be having some semi-forced down time and a great chance to relax.

The town I’m flying to is called Cairns (pronounced can-z, where the R went I have no idea) and it’s mucho tourist-ville. It’s also pretty close to where the cane toads were first introduced back in the 1930’s. This is my final field site for cane toads (woo hoo!). And if you remember that map I showed you…

The plan

The crux of my experiment is examining if the toads have made any physiological changes as they’ve marched across Australia. As I said earlier, they were introduced in Queensland (site 1) and blew up throughout the tropical paradise. They hit a wall of arid land (site 2) that took them a pretty long time to cross. If only a small fraction of the population made it across the divide, then multiplied rapidly (like they’ve done in the NT), you’d expect the toads from site 1 to be different from site 2, 3, and 4. Or possibly toads in moister/drier environments are similar, so site 1 & 3 (wet), and 2 & 4 (dry) are more comparable.

Who knows.

(Hopefully me in ~4 weeks)

I think I’ve given pretty ample justification. Getting toads from this site is pretty crucial to my experiment.

Hence the reason I just must fly out…

Why wouldn’t I dive the Great Barrier Reef while out there?

I guess it makes sense to go lay on the beach for a day, when in Rome.

Well of course I’m going to try to see a cassowary.

Stay in a hotel bed and not on my cot for 9 days? Sure.

Apparently I’ve turned into quite the little princess.

Because I left so early in the morning for Darwin, it wasn’t a very good idea to go out catch snakes last night. I wanted to take yesterday to explore my new field site in the daytime.

While not nearly as snakey in the light, it’s remarkable how beautiful the view is from on top of the hill (even though by California standards it isn’t much more than a gopher mound).

I think I have altitude sickness

I’m working in a drier, forested area surrounded by wetlands. The children’s pythons tend to be closer to the drier hill and the water pythons are closer to the wetter thick grass below.

The best of both worlds!

This spot had a prison on it for many years. After they shut it down they bulldozed the buildings and haphazardly left scraps, mounds, and landscaping all over the hill.

That’s not to say Mother Nature isn’t taking back what’s hers.

Sorry rock, that's my spot

The usual suspects (birds) were also out in full force.

Blue-winged Kookaburra (Dacelo leachii)

These birds love to eat lizards, frogs, and sometimes snakes like children’s pythons (boooo). As much as I want to hate 'em, that beak is pretty awesome. I hear there are parks in the NT where people can’t barbecue anymore because the kookaburra will steal the meat off the grill.