Roost Rulers
Small prey bully large predators… and win
Marzo 23, 2022
Tiny, fruit-eating bats take over the roost of larger, carnivorous bats at the edge of Panama’s Soberanía National Park.
Tiny, fruit-eating bats take over the roost of larger, carnivorous bats at the edge of Panama’s Soberanía National Park.
Most ocean life remains to be discovered. Because fish and many other animals that live in the ocean often have larvae or other, microscopic life stages that drift freely in ocean water, counting species by genetic barcoding of plankton samples adds to counts of species recorded as adults and is a highly efficient way to understand what lives in the ocean and how biodiversity changes as we modify the ocean environment.
From tracking the movements of large felines across the continent to helping rural communities reap the benefits of protecting biodiversity, director of Yaguará Panamá Foundation Ricardo Moreno turned his childhood dream into a mission.
Traditionally, we highlight the richness of the fauna that lives in the forests of Panama. However, the complex Panamanian forests also hide a diversity in the behavior of this fauna. Considering how small Panama is, for these same species, the behavior can vary according to its environment. In this talk we will talk about how camera traps provide us with pieces of the puzzle of the ecology and behavior of the fauna in Panama.
For many tropical biologists, all roads lead to Panama’s Barro Colorado Island, the most-studied piece of tropical real estate in the world. STRI Intern Omayra Meléndez shares her story about arriving on BCI and how the island is transforming her career.
Why do some male bats have sticky, odorous arms? The first clues only led to more questions. But now a new sleuth, Mariana Muñoz-Romo, described by a colleague as “probably the world’s expert on chemical communication in a bat species,” is on the case.
A discovery by a Smithsonian intern in Panama is published by the journal Science.
Join us to explore a few examples showcasing the spectrum of relationships among tropical organisms and their consequences from the genome to the global level. How does being in relationship change with time and what triggers tipping points that radically change the partners’ lives?
A disrupted mutualism sheds light on the dark web underneath the forest floor.
As winged mammals, baby bats learn to fly and stop drinking mothers’ milk during their transition from infants to flying juveniles. Bat researchers observed a new behavior. Mothers push pups away with their forearms, perhaps encouraging them to go explore the world on their own