My current mothing location is 1100 meters in elevation amongst the Monteverde Cloud Forest of Costa Rica. I am an undergraduate at the University of Georgia and started working with moths a few semesters ago when I joined Dr. John Pickering’s moth project (http://www.discoverlife.org/moth/). I didn’t know anything about moths, or even much about entomology and other insects before I started my work. But now, barely a year later, I am so intrigued by the diversity that I have started my own project to compare seasonal flight at the University of Georgia’s satellite campus in San Luis.
I have two different light set-ups on campus. I stay in a small cabin in the woods and have a twin bed sheet strung up with a 100 watt CFL bulb and a 40 watt black light just outside my front door. My other set-up is a 250 watt MV bulb that overlooks a large open area. The different bulbs and the different surroundings have attracted noticeably unique species, and between the two I am hoping to achieve a fairly complete sampling of the area.
I started my sampling near the end of the dry-season and was lucky enough to catch the transition period to the wet-season, when both numbers and species diversity exploded. I’ll be mothing at this location through the beginning of August, with plans to return next summer. I have already been blown away by what I have seen, but I can’t wait to find what else Costa Rica has in store.
Happy Mothing,
Cameron Prybol
