Well just got back into the US. Costa was a little shorter than planned due to a few different things....but I am not complaining! All that time in the jungle was one of the best things I have experienced. I went along with 2 other herper friends from sandiego.

This expedition was "T-rex great adventure - Costa Rica". i was filming the trip so look out for the video coming soon! I do not have pics of everything seen due to the fact that I was filming.

Arrived in san jose, costa rica and met up with another great herper and his wife...quetzal and monica. They run a reptile park and breeding facility in dominical on the pacific side. Landing in costa rica was amazing...the humidity and heat once exiting the airconditioned airport made me happy and excited...felt kinda like home. Have not felt humidity for a while. Started our trip by heading to the southern carribean side straight from the airport. Got there around midnight... we met up with brian kubicki. He is the founder of the C.R.A.R.C.(Costa Rican Amphibian Research Center), and has been living in Costa Rica since 1998 conducting biological research with amphibians, having a special interest in glass frogs of the family Centrolenidae. As we arrived the call of tree frogs gave us a bit of energy and we started to look around with flashlights...great adventure costa rica has begun!

Learned a real lot from brian and his reserve was an amazing place with many species. Some really cool frogs were seen...the first morning I saw tons of poison dart frogs...after seeing the first million of them it got a litle old haha. They are really beautiful and they are a little cheeky knowing that nothing is going to try eat them....which makes caching em that much easier haha. I never eralized they are so small though! I had never seen a dendrobates before. We also saw a really rare tree frog on his reserve...i almost walked right past it on a night hike in the jungle. It was an Agalychnis calcarifer(now know as cruziohyla calcarifer if I remember clearly)





that particular trek I will never forget....was my first time in the jungle at night...we saw so many things and the sounds were amazing. Heat overwhelming too! was an intense hike. Saw my first salamander and tarantula too! An if any of you know me...i am scared of spiders and not afraid to admit it haha. but when someone shouted tarantula I had to check it out....and thought to myself...when do I have the chance to pick up a wild tarantula in the rainforest eh? I don't know much about spiders, or what species it was but I was sure it would not kill me so I just went for it....i think I have lost my fear for touching spiders too....as we found another a few days later. But hey...still don't do those walking into the web dances haha .

There were many things I just had to see knowing they were common in CR. One of them being a red eyed tree frog - Agalychnis callidryas. It was really fun to photograph these beauties

This one is for matt....there was this still undescribed species of velvet worm. What an amazing critter....sprayed this "glue" all over me when I picked it up(u can see it on my fingers)...but it was real alien looking and would be so cool to keep.

One of our main goals of the trip was to get dna from a species of sea snake found on the pacific side(Pelamis platurus - Yellow-bellied Sea Snake).The ones found down there have different venom and are smaller...we want to seperate them to a diferent species. we stayed down there for a while and went out on a boat for a day looking for them...we finally saw one but it got away even after one of us fell in trying to get it haha. Got sun burned to a crisp on that little adventure...ouch! the whole day ouut on a boat in the tropical sun and no sunscreen....my bad. In Dominical we visited the reptile park(reptilandia). A real amazing place with some real amazing herps! They even have a komodo dragon. Their setups are insane and they realy harness nature in providing for the herps which was quite impressive. Got to meet the komodo...what a girl. Was fun taking pics of her while she just eyeballs you.

The highlight of the trip had to be the bush masters! If anyone knows anything about them...it is this. You are not going to see one in the wild. We saw both species.....you have no idea how excited we were. The local herpers could not even believe our luck. These beautys are very seldom seen and to see both within 48hrs is unheard of. After seeing the first one I could have gone home happy. These snakes were so chilled out it was unbelievable...not even a hiss or anything. Got onto the hook like a dream and
were huge! Such awesome snakes! I only got photos of the one- Lachesis stenophrys. The Lachesis melanocephala was found at night hen it was dumping with heavy rain....so no pics. But got video of the encounter though.

We then headed up to the guanacaste region for some herping and road cruising. One of the funnest things was trying to catch a Spiny-tailed Iguana, Ctenosaurus similis. The pretty female was real feisty.These things are fast and agro! new respect for you iguana keepers out there haha. The whole trip was somthing I will never forget and will definetly go back some time in the future. Some more random pics....(we found so many different things that I could never mention or show them all)

this was a HUGE!! coral snake. I never knew they got this big and would hate to know what a bite would be like(micurus nigrocinctus):

others:

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Don't be jealous the voices only speak to me...

www.herprecon.org

Most Excellent Post! Thanks for the pics, they are great.

Now THIS is field herping

Awww Dev, you rock. Thanks for the letting us live the adventure with you. Your pics are amazing!!!

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MARSHA

:D I'm smiling because I have no idea whats going on!

Very good, Devon. I give you an A+! (Seriously, thanks for the report!)

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Amy

Dev,,,,you are SOOOOOO lucky....thanks for sharing.

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Ken
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference in the world. But, the Marines don't have that problem." -- Ronald Reagan

oh man... amazing pictures, you lucky little freak

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Yes my name is D... Yes as in the letter... No i wont tell you what it stands for!!!

Thanks for taking the time to share with us. Very awesome trip.

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Mike
"Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time, and always start with the person nearest you." - Mother Teresa

Fantastic report and photos, Devon.

THANK YOU !!

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Regards,
Joao

Congrats on FINALLY finding a salamander...I suppose the excitement was probably trumped by all the other amazing things you've seen...but now I can't rub all of my salamander pictures into your face as easily.
As always great shots!

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Those who say it can't be done should get out of the way of those who are doing it.

~*~Lacey~*~

My Photos

Absolutely amazing! You must have been on cloud nine most of the time!
What incredible finds!!
Glad you made it back healthy! Thanks for all the pics and stories.

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Andrea