If you sit long enough...and listen...

I never fancied myself an acoustic ecologist until I began to read studies of songbirds and the information that could be gained from asking questions about variation in species' dialects, and phylogeographic range affecting diversity of calls and song; and in some cases what was ventured to be called derivation in culture.

There is a reason little of this sort of work remains to be done on subterranean rodents. Most don't call, or sing for that matter. Coruros are amazing little novelties of nature. But I am begining to wonder more and more, what is the MAIN purpose of this call? I am 3 weeks into intensive study of these critters and finding some very intriguing results. And always developing more questions.

For example, I have identified a bird that calls at the same syllable frequency(number of call per length of time) of the coruro. However, if one listens carefully you can distinguish the frequency, or pitch, as being much higher. What is this bird? What is it's role in the ecosystem? What is the purpose of the call itself?

Another question that is on everyone's mind is whether or not coruros have calls that distinguish terrestrial predators from aerial ones. In degus, the answer appears to be 'no', but coruros are not as exposed as degus and we do not yet have a strong list of known predators at Rinconada. We can only make conjectures. We are seeing an interesting trend where juveniles are likely to alarm call at anything that moves or touches them. These alarm calls start as early as 2 weeks of age, but they do not begin foraging for themselves until they are approximately 42 days old (http://heritage-pets.tripod.com/id63.html). But does this call deviate over time to specify the type of predator?

Also, we have noticed other animals using old coruro burrows as homes, ranging from other rodents, birds and even reptiles. Are coruros facilitators for these other animals? Would they exist in this environment without the coruros present? Would the huilie be so abundant if the coruros were not possibly cultivating it, leaving smaller bulbs in abandoned food cashes? This seems to be a possible theory as we are begging to notice clumps of these lilly-like plants rising from the earth. I cannot wait to see them bloom this Austral spring.

All these thoughts draw me in as I sit quietly on the hillside, observing the colony and waiting for little black heads to appear from the ground. And then, you begin to listen for the coruros' calls. But after a time you begin to hear more than you could imagine: the grass shedding the frost from it's stalks in the early morning sun, the birds chattering as they flock across the small valley, brightly colored Loica singing and gossiping all around you, the annoying juvenile buzzard eagle (Junior) calling to his parents to feed him, and the endearing degus appearing from their burrows to 'cheap, cheap, cheap' at you. But of course the disrupting sounds of civilization that play the base in this orchestra are not to be forgotten. The distant sounds of airplanes, trains, emergency sirens and military academy practicing their cadence day in and day out. But the story of a world once unknown to you finally becomes just a tiny bit clearer as you sink into it and you become a part of it...and it a part of you.

Our day trip to Valpo, Chile

So Michael and I decided to take a break from our research and go on a road trip to get out of Santiago. Loren had suggested we visit a place on the Pacific coast called Valparaíso. It's attraction being the colorful buildings and unique architecture. Many of the museums held wonders to be seen. The Nautical Museum, the Museum of Natural History and Neruda's boyhood home. We were told about these lovely little neighborhoods and how you could take a cab or a funicular to visit these places. The market places on the main drag are bustling with fruit and vegetable venders, people selling trinkets and clothing. Sounded like the place to be.

Well, ironically enough, we chose the one weekend in July that Chileans celebrated a saint. The Feast of the Virgin del Carmen (http://www.whatsonwhen.com/sisp/index.htm?fx=event&event_id=19254). We witness a parade while on the hunt for open bank and suspicions were raised. W shortly after came to discover everyone, everywhere takes the day off. So we wait to decide whether we really want to go until late Friday night. And neither of us with any real conviction or energy decide to plan everything out in the morning.

Well, on Saturday morning we set out for the 1 1/2 hr. long drive to Valpo, as it is affectionately known, and find the freeway amazingly well designed. This is also stated in nearly all guide books, but seeing is believing. Depending on poor navigational tools on and off the maps, we arrive at the heart of tourist activity. Setting off, we discover the Natural History Museum to be closed for renovation. This was very disheartening as we planned to spend much of our day here. Moving on, we discover a plaza with a rather large cathedral.

Iglesias Catedral de Valparaiso

This was Plaza Santa Victoria. Full of families and stray dogs, we sat on a bench to people-watch and evamp our plan. We decided to spend the rest of our day wandering through the Cerros with colorful houses and decorative graffiti murals. This turned out to be quite the adventure. Wandering in circles at the top of hill covered with Cerro Conception, we finally settled on a Chileno-French restaurant. It was quite popular and crowded, but we enjoyed our meal. Again we set off. Trying to read the road signs proved challenging and we decided to skip the funicular and simply walk ourselves down the hillside, making friends with all the strays of course.

Creative and colorful murals in cerros of Vaplo

We wandered around for a bit and found ourselves at a bridge looking out over the Pacific Ocean. I saw cargo barges, tankers, fishing boats and naval ships all mingling about in the bay. The wildlife also appeared to mingle as we saw a cormorant among large gulls. Further off by a sea wall we observed a large male sea lion sunning itself in the afternoon sun.


We concluded our tour of the city with getting very lost on our way back to Santiago. This was a surreal adventure. Following the signs that pointed us somehow back to Santiago, we passed through neighborhoods with incredibly narrow roads zigzaging up and down hill sides, avoiding dogs, children, flying toys, and an elderly couple walking their donkey...

We finally found our way back to the freeway, however, the entrance to the freeway was closed due to construction. That is when the fun really started. Chileans, it appears, do not believe in turnarounds. We somehow ended up in what the signs called Con-Con, near to Vina del Mar. A lovely drive, but not one we ever dreamed of taking just to get back to our humble little apartment in Santiago.

Thankfully, our adventure came to a close just after sunset. Michael and I agreed that we had had enough vacation and were ready to get back to work on Sunday. We move on to a new colony and are hoping that our sample size will continue to increase as we become better at our trapping techniques. Also a little good coruro juju couldn't hurt. Wish us luck, all!