Island in the Sun

Today was a Tahitian blast. There was a boat dive just outside of Cook's Bay in the morning. The divers saw some blacktip reef sharks and got some great pictures. After a fantastic traditional Tahitian lunch the group split up. The fish crew went over to the public beach to dive and snorkel, spearing 11 butterflyfish for the UV project. The lizard group drove up toward Belvedere and hiked a new trail to look for the gold dust day gecko(Phelsuma laticauda) that may have been introduced to the island. After dinner Michael and Steve did natural history presentations on the longnose butterflyfish and the cowfish respectively. Then the fish people got to dissecting eyes and testing UV aborbance with the spectrophotometer- wait- the preliminary results are just in- the retinas are potentially sensitive to UV wavelengths! The lizard people are currently out in the jungle using headlamps to take a census of lizards in the transects they set up earlier in the week. Oh yeah- the girls went off to the market this afternoon to get all kinds of goodies without telling the boys. The Gelato store is up near "the dude ranch" though so we win anyway. So much science to do, so little time- more fun in the sun tomorrow.
Andy