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A Day Of Canyons – 7th September 2017


The cold desert mornings seem to feel slightly colder each time you try to wake up and get ready for the demanding day ahead, but never the less you jump out of bed and make a dash for your warmest clothes only knowing you’ll be removing layers and the sun makes an appearance once the camanchaca has cleared up.



Our day seemed like any other- breakfast followed then by a half hour drive to our research base. This time however things were different. We were getting up to go on a hike to the canyons and set up various camera traps in the hopes of capturing mammals and with the ultimate goal of seeing an extremely elusive Mountain Lion, Puma concolor. But before we could go we had our 3rd and 4th lectures followed by lunch. One lecture was about various insect orders and their characteristic features while another one was bout the Atacama Desert and the lizard and amphibian species that you could come across.



Once at the canyon it wasn’t long until we spotted our first amphibian the Atacama toad, Rhinella atacamensis, be it a little flattened by a vehicle it was still an astonishing site as these amphibians are extremely rare. From this point on the sightings of animals kept coming in. Some of various bird species, others of plants and then a fair few that confirmed the presence of pumas and other carnivorous animals - guanaco skeletons. The most spectacular sighting must have been of a tufted eared owl, magellanicus, that just gracefully flew over us before perching next to a large boulder and keeping its watchful eyes on us. After reaching the preferred locations of high just about accessible places that you have to scrabble up steep slopes to reach (perfect for nocturnal predators) we set about setting up our camera traps. Once done, we made our way back yet again admiring the immense beauty of a flowering desert.


We however didn’t go back to Huasco to retire for the day, we stayed and had a magnificent barbeque surrounded by some pretty impressive landscape. We stayed here for hours, just talking and eating and enjoying the unique experience that we are getting in addition to contemplating what projects we may possibly start in the next couple of days.












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