Confessions of a Las Tangaras Camera Trap

As there is no electricity at Las Tangaras, the sun defines our days. The sun rises and wakes us, lights our journey through the day and then when the sun disappears, it lets us know that it’s time to relax and unwind. During the day, while we go about our daily chores, we a privy to a huge amount of avian, mammalian and herpetological species and we are constantly kept in a state of wonder with each new encounter. You would think this would be enough for us…. But you would be wrong. We needed to know what was prowling the darkness after the doors of the lodge were firmly closed. So, with the help of our trusty camera trap, we delved into the Las Tangaras nights. This is the result of our first 2 weeks camera trapping.

 Central American Agouti (Dasyprocta punctata)

Although we have an Agouti that regularly visits our back yard, so regularly in fact that we have named him Frugal, we had no real idea of how many Agoutis were occupying Las Tangaras and in what habitats. Based on our preliminary photo trapping we have found Agoutis to be numerous and widespread throughout the Riparian and Secondary Forest habitats. Most of our camera trapping records are from between the hours of 4.30pm and 6pm with the addition of occasional daytime observation.

This species of Agouti is the most widespread in the Americas, distributed from Mexico down into northern South America.

Oncilla  (Leopardus tigrinus Spp. pardinoides)

By far our favorite and most exciting camera trapping result is this one of a small Oncilla. This tiny jungle cat was photographed in Secondary Forest cautiously coming in to check out the cows digestive tract that we were using as bait. Given that this species is known to have a territory of only 2km squared it is safe to assume that the majority of this animal’s territory, if not the whole thing, is contained within Las Tangaras.

Footprints for this species were also found a day after this photograph was taken only 50m from the house. These tracks measured less than 5cm in length which gives you some idea of how small these cats actually are. This cat is know to eat small mammals, lizards, birds, eggs, invertebrates, and the occasional tree frog which is good… because there is an abundance of all of these within Las Tangaras. Oncillas are typically distributed from Costa Rica through to Northern Argentina, and show a strong preference for montane forest.

This species is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List.

Paca (Cuniculus paca)

Although they look rather similar, with the obvious exception of the stripes, the Paca is not as common as the Aguti within Las Tangaras. In fact, this is the first of 2 we have observed here. This animal was photographed in Riparian habitat, attracted by the bait of egg and banana that we were using at the time. 

Interestingly, Pacas originated in South America and are one of the few mammal species that successfully emigrated to North America after the Great American Interchange 3 million years ago. Their similarities with Agutis mean that they were formerly grouped with the agoutis in the family Dasyproctidae, subfamily Agoutinae, but were given full family status because they differ in the number of toes, the shape of the skull, and coat patterning.

Black Eared O’Possum (Didelphis marsupialis)

The scavenger of the forest, the O’Possum has appeared in every single trapping period in which we used meat in the Secondary Forest habitat. Wherever present, they increase the survey effort required by us because they come in and eat all of the bait in the first few hours, therefore removing the incentive for other species to come in to the camera trapping site. Although frustrating at times, this is still the first time we have seen a wild O’Possum on our Journey so it was still pretty exciting.

This opossum is found in tropical and subtropical forest, both primary and secondary, at altitudes up to 2200 m.  

Stay tuned for more Confessions of a Las Tangaras Camera Trap.