Catching critters in the mountains

This week my group headed to the Drakensburg Mountains to Mariepskop Reserve to catch small mammals and reptiles. So far the research groups (of previous trips) have found new species and provided some of the only data on the where and when certain species can be found throughout the year. Sadly, as we are going into winter, most of the animals were inactive so we only caught a few striped mice, a shrew and a doormouse :) We use little, humane traps to catch them, then anesthetize them with a little ether in a bag, and measure and weigh them quickly before they wake up. That part was ok but it consisted of a lot of long uncomfortable incredibly bumby rides in the back of a pickup to find very few animals. It got old kinda fast. And we weren't successful at all with the lizard catching. I found I was a decent hand at frog catching though, which was good times. The weather got a bit crap the last few days which put a damper on the mood. The mtns were beautiful but with the mist you couldnt see much of anything and the others were getting pretty soaked in the back of the pickup (I was fully cloaked in waterproof but it was a downer nonetheless). We also didn't have power in the cabin. It was nice and quaint but we tended to go to bed very early to wake up to more rain and no animals. All in all I'm glad we went for a few days but will be glad to get back to the reserve. I've posted some pics from this and last week including the elephants charging, catching frogs in the river and some of the other gorgeous animals I've come across. Should be getting tons more this coming week. And with the fast connection here in SA I should be able to upload the pics every week of so. Take care!