Michelle Rodrigues is telling tales

Michelle Rodrigues, graduate student at (THE)Ohio State University, is currently in the field at El Zota, Costa Rica collecting dissertation data on spider monkey behavioral ecology. She has a great blog called Spider Monkey Tales that I highly recommend to other BANDITs, and she has blogged recently about her current field season.

An excerpt:
"It´s still raining, but the downpour is lessening. Evelyn and Elsa are still resting in the same spot. Through my binoculars, I can make out just a portion of Elsa´s face, pressed up against her mother´s fur. Both she and her mother have shifted slightly, though they remain tightly huddled. I love the way spider monkeys sleep. They tend to sit upright, hunch their backs and curl their limbs and tails, either around themselves and their resting partners. They then tuck their heads down, completing the transformation to an immobile, huddled mass of fur. When I did observations in the morning at Brookfield Zoo, there would usually be a small cluster of monkeys huddled in a quiet corner. Occasionally, Evita and Elvis would look up and whinny at me, and then tuck their heads back down."

Lovely writing and also a great way to educate others about fieldwork. Nicely done, Michelle!