A Golden-toed Toad

A toad in the Eleocharis.

Wayne found this toad in some weedy vegetation at the edge of a drainage pond in the small village of Tiahuanaco. The plants in which the toad was hiding appear to be an Eleocharis species, but I'm saving that topic for later. This little guy had some friends with him too. We found several more individuals of this species scurrying around under the pond weeds. Based on their size and abundance, my guess is that they are recently hatched young.

Golden toes.

Except for those bright golden toes, these toads are relatively drab little critters. Perhaps the golden toes are an adaptation to scare off potential predators? If so, they certaintly aren't broadcasting a very powerful signal. Those little golden toes are nowhere near as shocking as the bright colors of the poison frogs of the lowland rainforests, although I these little toads are probably also very toxic. Living in the cold altiplano probably requires these toads to have much slower metabolisms than their lowland relatives. Maybe manufacturing such bright colors in such a harsh climate just has too great a metabolic cost.

Bolivia!

Bolivia beckons travelers with craggy arid fingers into its sky-high embrace. In its dry central valleys, nestled among the icebound summits of the Andes, recent arrivals sip coca tea and try to focus on the stunning costumes of the local chola women instead of the dizzying, head-pounding altitude sickness.

It's been a week since I arrived in Bolivia, and I have finally adjusted to life at two and half miles above sea level. Last Tuesday morning my friend/field slave Wayne and I landed at El Alto Airport which, at 13,500 feet, is the highest airport in the world. Unfortunately, our luggage didn't make it onto the plane in Miami and so we caught a taxi headed for the city below with nothing but our carry-on baggage, i.e. no toothbrushes or deodorant. Fortunately, our luggage arrived the next morning's flight.

La Paz, Bolivia. Nevado Illimani looms in the distance.

La Paz sits at the head of a canyon that faces south. Square brick buildings cling to the canyon walls and sprawl out into the valley below. Narrow alleys switch back and forth throughout the terraced landscape, and street vendors hawk every kind of ware you could ever imagine along the narrow sidewalks, from cell phones and digital cameras to scissors and thread. The vivid shawls and skirts of the local women glow between the cramped stalls and among the narrow alleys, while shoeshine boys wearing ski masks to protect their identity wander among the foot traffic, pointing at men's shoes, hopeful to attract customers. The city's motor traffic, mostly composed of diesel buses, pumps clouds of thick black pollution into the air from dawn until dusk, darkening the air and choking the unfortunate tourists who have no choice but to breathe the awful fumes.

As we descended along the smog-choked highway into the main downtown core, our taxi honked, swerved, and strayed alarmingly close to the cliff at the edge of the highway. I am convinced that anyone in the United States who tried driving like a Latin American taxi driver would have their license revoked for life.

Our chaotic descent into urban La Paz ended when our taxi deposited us in a quiet corner of the city, and after locating ourselves on the map, we climbed a small, gentle hill to a cafe and sat down, completely breathless and gasping, for our first cup of coca tea. Then we checked into our hotel and settled down into a very long nap. When we woke up, it was clear that the next few days would bring pain. My head throbbed and my body ached with the lack of oxygen. Coca tea helps alleviate the altitude sickness, but has a few annoying side effects of its own, like restlessness and a constant, gnawing hunger. Now that the altitude sickness has abated, I am back to drinking coffee instead.

Morning foot traffic in Plaza San Francisco.

This city comes to life early, around four AM when the air is still cold and the sun has just begun to brighten the sky above the peaks of the Andes to the east. It bustles all day, even during the lunch hours when much of Latin America takes a nap, and it doesn't go back to sleep until one AM the next day. And it is old! Most of the original cathedrals from the Spanish colonial era still stand, as monumental reminders of the subjugation of Bolivia by Spain. But except for the cathedrals and the the fact that everyone speaks Spanish, you might never guess that this country experienced several centuries of iron-fisted Spanish rule. The people, for the most part, have retained their South American heritage, and the food is still heavily dominated by dishes containing llama, potatoes, quinoa, and maize, the staples of the Aymara and Quechua cultures that have constituted the majority of the population for the last millenium or so.

Perhaps part of the explanation for the resilience of the ancient cultures lies in the landscape itself. It seems reasonable to assume that the harsh environment of the Altiplano has imparted its unwavering strength to the cultures that it supported for so many centuries before the Spanish arrived. This landscape defies any kind of domination. To the south, the massive jagged glaciated crags of Nevado Illimani loom against the grey skyline. The mountain is indescribably huge. It dwarfs the Cascades, and makes the Rockies seem more like a range of medium-sized foothills. And even at 6,438 meters above sea level, Illimani is still just a regular sized mountain in this part of the world. There are at least ten other mountains in Bolivia that break the 6,000 meter mark, and to the north and south of here, there are almost one hundred more! The only mountain on the entire continent of North America that can even compare is Denali, Alaska's grandest volcano, which tops off at 6,193 meters. Denali is undeniably big, but even so, it still can't compete with the Andes.

The mountains play big roles in the local folklore. Each mountain has an apu, or mountain spirit, who the local people honor with ceremonies and offerings, in hopes that the mountain will remain pleased and will not bring ill fortune to the people living in its shadow. Even though Catholicism is the de facto religion of the country, most Bolivians still hold traditional spiritual beliefs as well, and integrate ancestral religious practices with Catholic dogma in their day to day lives. For instance, under the corner stone of almost every house in La Paz lies a llama fetus, placed there as an offering to the household god Pachamama. As I write this, street vendors two blocks away in the Mercado de Hechicería are hawking dried llama fetuses to passers by for this exact purpose. You can also buy dried bird fetuses and all manner of other interesting items at their shops. I have no idea what the bird fetuses and other items are used for, but I suspect their uses are not Catholic in origin.

The face of the altiplano

So far, we haven't seen much of the country except the Altiplano. Outside the city, the landscape is arid and straw-brown, interrupted occasionally by small red or blue wildflowers. Cactus and grasses dominate the dry slopes where agriculture has not yet disturbed the local flora, and a surprising variety of birds forage among the sparse weeds. During the day, the temperature doesn't usually rise much above the high sixties (Fahrenheit, not Celsius!) although the bright tropical sun blazes down, scorching the landscape and practically demanding that sunglasses be worn at all times. At night, it drops down to near freezing. Even six layers of woolen blankets weren't enough to keep me warm the night we stayed in Tiahuanaco. Next time I will bring my sleeping bag too.

I have been working on getting permits and extending our visas to cover our entire stay, which has been an exercise in bureaucratic nonsense. The number of pieces of paper that need to be printed, filled out, signed, stamped, annotated, stapled, filed, approved, and then finally thrown away boggles the mind. But I am very pleased to say that after several adventures including a visit to a notary public and numerous visits to the immigration office, this afternoon we finally submitted our visa extension applications, and hopefully within the next couple of days the permit application will also be complete. Then, once all the red tape has been cut to ribbons, the real adventure begins!

Hand lens

–noun
A magnifying glass designed to be held in the hand. Also called hand glass. (Definition courtesy of dictionary.com).

A hand lens is a tool used in the field by botanists, biologists, geologists, and other people who are interested in seeing things that are not usually visible to the naked eye. Think of it as the equivalent of a portable microscope. My goal is that this blog will function in a similar capacity, by magnifying parts of the world and experiences that would not normally be visible to you.

I am a botanist by nature and by trade, and my understanding of biological processes has shaped my understanding of the world, just as it will shape the contents of this blog. Nature in general fascinates me, and will be a primary topic. And since I consider myself an evangelist of all things flowering (and some things not), rest assured that I will preach the gospel of botany on a regular basis.

So welcome to The Hand Lens! Take a look around, see what shows up under the magnifying glass.