Barro Colorado Island BCI
As we looked through our windows this morning we found a lush rainforest surrounding the ship, and a blue sky reflecting on mirrored green waters. Both gave the general feeling of peace and greatness.
The Sea Voyager is the only ship with the permission to visit Barro Colorado Island (BCI), a Scientific paradise right in the middle of the Panama Canal’s Gatun Lake. BCI has been a biological reserve since 1923, not long after the area was isolated from the mainland by the creation of the Gatun Lake. The Island itself covers around 3,300 acres of rainforest, where the things get to be so large: flower petals the size of a cake plates, beetles like apples, leaves as long as coffee tables. One of the rules here is to grow as big as you can… if not, someone is going to grow you out. This is nature at its highest creative powers. One of our walk options took place in one of the five peninsulas added to BCI in 1979, giving the island the title of Nature Monument.
Everyone came back to the boat from the walks and Zodiac cruises amazed by the diversity of animals they saw: monkeys, birds, snakes and some of us got the great gift of seeing a tamandua anteater in full action. The name “Tamandua” comes from the Tupi (natives of Brazil) “Taa” meaning ant and “mandeu” meaning trap. Most of what is known about its natural history is derived from studies done here at BCI.
Each tamandua individual has its own diet and preference on where or when to forage, some will eat more ants, while others prefer termites and some will be not that picky, so they will feed on ants, termites and bees. We saw our friend 15ft off the ground showing great climbing ability, with the help of its prehensile tail. An adult tamandua anteater can consume about 9000 ants and termites each day.
How do they manage to not get stung? Why if there are many huge ant and termite colonies they just don’t sit there and eat them all? They tend to avoid ants and termites that have particularly spiny bodies, big jaws or nasty chemicals such as the leaf-cutting ant-soldiers and army ants. So they feed only for few seconds on each nest, and then are gone, before the soldiers are aware of their presence and come to sting them.
Their sticky saliva enables them to quickly gather large numbers of insects before they move to another nest. Normally they have from 60 to 180 acres of home range, so they will visit each nest in their territory without destroying it completely. An adult anteater can visit from 50 to 80 colonies a day. We also enjoyed the sight of monkeys, crocodiles and beautiful birds.
Later today, we left towards Pedro Miguel and Miraflores Locks through Galliard (Culebra) Cut, reaching the Bay of Panama in the Pacific Ocean.
As we looked through our windows this morning we found a lush rainforest surrounding the ship, and a blue sky reflecting on mirrored green waters. Both gave the general feeling of peace and greatness.
The Sea Voyager is the only ship with the permission to visit Barro Colorado Island (BCI), a Scientific paradise right in the middle of the Panama Canal’s Gatun Lake. BCI has been a biological reserve since 1923, not long after the area was isolated from the mainland by the creation of the Gatun Lake. The Island itself covers around 3,300 acres of rainforest, where the things get to be so large: flower petals the size of a cake plates, beetles like apples, leaves as long as coffee tables. One of the rules here is to grow as big as you can… if not, someone is going to grow you out. This is nature at its highest creative powers. One of our walk options took place in one of the five peninsulas added to BCI in 1979, giving the island the title of Nature Monument.
Everyone came back to the boat from the walks and Zodiac cruises amazed by the diversity of animals they saw: monkeys, birds, snakes and some of us got the great gift of seeing a tamandua anteater in full action. The name “Tamandua” comes from the Tupi (natives of Brazil) “Taa” meaning ant and “mandeu” meaning trap. Most of what is known about its natural history is derived from studies done here at BCI.
Each tamandua individual has its own diet and preference on where or when to forage, some will eat more ants, while others prefer termites and some will be not that picky, so they will feed on ants, termites and bees. We saw our friend 15ft off the ground showing great climbing ability, with the help of its prehensile tail. An adult tamandua anteater can consume about 9000 ants and termites each day.
How do they manage to not get stung? Why if there are many huge ant and termite colonies they just don’t sit there and eat them all? They tend to avoid ants and termites that have particularly spiny bodies, big jaws or nasty chemicals such as the leaf-cutting ant-soldiers and army ants. So they feed only for few seconds on each nest, and then are gone, before the soldiers are aware of their presence and come to sting them.
Their sticky saliva enables them to quickly gather large numbers of insects before they move to another nest. Normally they have from 60 to 180 acres of home range, so they will visit each nest in their territory without destroying it completely. An adult anteater can visit from 50 to 80 colonies a day. We also enjoyed the sight of monkeys, crocodiles and beautiful birds.
Later today, we left towards Pedro Miguel and Miraflores Locks through Galliard (Culebra) Cut, reaching the Bay of Panama in the Pacific Ocean.
