Sometimes I record something interesting and I think ‘I should share this with the good people who read the Tico Times,’ but whatever it is I want to share isn’t quite enough for an entire article. It could be because I’ve already written about that particular creature or a video is neat but doesn’t really need a full page of text to accompany it. I’ve decided the best way to share this sort of information with you is to smoosh a couple of unrelated tidbits into one article and label it Latest News. Let’s dive in.
Predators in Action
Each camera trap monitors just a few square meters of Costa Rica’s wilderness. I’m continuously shocked at the variety of species and animal behaviors these tiny windows into the wild provide. One type of behavior that proves particularly elusive is predation. What are the chances that a predator will pursue its prey directly in front of one of my cameras?
Well, recently, I’ve had a stretch of amazing luck and recorded three different predator-prey interactions. The first was a puma chasing a spotted paca in the mouth of a giant cave. I’m not sure if the paca got away or not. The second was a juvenile white-tailed deer running for its life from a pair of coyotes. You only catch a glimpse of the chase, but from the distance between the lead coyote and the deer, it seems likely that coyotes were going to catch their prey. The final video featured two greater grisons going after a giant toad. Little was left to the imagination here, as one of the grisons pranced off with the toad in its jaws. You can see all three clips in the video below.
A New Generation of Jaguars
Any time I record a jaguar anywhere in the country my little hearts sings for just a second. Imagine how it sang when I clicked on a video from a camera in northern Guanacaste and not only was I looking at a daytime video of a female jaguar, but her big fat belly indicated that she was carrying the next generation of Tico jaguars. This was my first video of a visibly pregnant female jaguar.
As if that wasn’t good enough, the same camera recorded a second daytime video of a different, very pregnant, female jaguar only a day later. I was shocked! In total, over a stretch of thirteen days, I recorded ten videos of pregnant jaguars on two different camera traps.
Here’s the final astonishing bit of news. Last night I was reviewing my jaguar database in order to confirm that these two females were indeed two distinct jaguars by comparing their spot patterns. Not only did I confirm that they were two different individuals, but I’m 99% sure that amongst the ten videos, one shows a third pregnant jaguar with a pattern of rosettes that doesn’t match the other two!
This seems so incredibly unlikely that I don’t want to believe it. I keep reviewing the screenshots from the videos and it really does seem as though there are three different pregnant female jaguars. I will get my friend and jaguar expert to double check my work because it seems too crazy. Either way, check out the videos of two or three pregnant jaguars below.
About the Author
Vincent Losasso, founder of Guanacaste Wildlife Monitoring, is a biologist who works with camera traps throughout Costa Rica.
