Heading for Quintana Roo, Mexico (March 22, 2013)

Image of the beach in Akumal, Mexico. Of course, I spent my time in the hot, dusty, non-beach side of town. I've been to Mexico before--in fact, I lived there for almost five months in college--however I knew that a trip to Cancun and surrounding towns would be different from my experiences in Guadalajara. For starters, the whole area is designed almost exclusively for tourism, with dozens of high-walled "all-inclusive" resorts along the highway from Cancun to Akumal. The plane I took was filled with travelers headed for these destinations, which for me has always been nothing more than a chance to sit on a private beach and get bored while never having a chance to see what Mexico really has to offer. Visitors to these resorts can go about their days without ever speaking a word of Spanish, which for me completely defeats the purpose of heading for Mexico in the first place. This is the country where I had my first Spanish-language conversation, and it's where I learned to speak with enough facility to survive two years in Panama. People who travel to a Spanish-speaking country without ever actually bothering to learn a few words and phrases are the ones who make shake my head and sigh. But I wasn't in Mexico to criticize the tourism industry, I was there to find spiders. Akumal (about an hour south of Cancun) was where the spiders were first reported to be vegetarian, and that's where I was headed. I'd been told that there was a stand of acacia plants (the spiders' preferred host) under high-voltage electrical towers on the inland side of town, so that's where I made my first stop.

Map source: http://www.travelyucatan.com/akumal_mexico.php Now the host plant where Bagheera kiplingi generally lives is not a friendly-looking plant. It has definite character in its own right, however its beauty comes with inch-long, hollow spines that cover most of the branches and trunk.

Image of Vachellia collinsii, Photo source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Acacia_Collinssi.JPG Note the ants and what appears to be some sort of a silken spider nest in the center. While these thorns may have originally evolved to discourage herbivores (many acacia plants have this defense), the thorns of Vachellia collinsii and its relatives have taken this mechanism to a new level, in which highly-aggressive Pseudomyrmex ants live inside the hollowed-out structures and vigorously defend the plant from any animal that might try to nibble on the leaves. As one who has been stung by these particular ant on many occasions, I can confirm that this is a powerful deterrent to any hungry leaf-eater.

Image credit for Pseudomyrmex peperi: April Nobile of AntWeb.org Stinging ants? You might ask. Don't they bite instead? Well, ants actually belong to the insect order Hymenoptera, along with wasps and bees. Many ant species have powerful stings, including the Central American "bullet" ant (Paraponera clavata), whose name says everything you'd ever need to know about its sting!

Image source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Paraponera_clavata.jpg Thankfully, Pseudomyrmex ants aren't quite so bad as Paraponera, although I have not (yet) been stung by all of the species that inhabit acacia plants in Central America. One of them, a Panamanian species named Pseudomyrmex satanicus has a name that makes me wonder how painful the sting might be. In addition to shelter, the ants receive food as a reward for defending their plant host. This nourishment comes in the form of nectar via small "nectaries" at the base of many leaves (which actually tastes quite good) and "Beltian bodies," or specialized leaf tips (named after Thomas Belt) that contain all of the nutrients that the ants (and their larvae) need to survive.

Nectaries on a leaf of Vachellia collinsii. The sources of nectar are the small, round structures on the right side. Image credit: http://lcarley.blogspot.com/2011/04/palo-verde-pt-4-independent-projects.html

Beltian bodies on the leaf of Vachellia cornigera, a close relative of V. collinsii. Image credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:A-cornigera.jpg Bagheera kiplingi takes advantage of this system by using its keen eyesight and smart (for a spider) brain to avoid the ant patrols, stealing Beltian bodies and nectar for its own consumption. It nests directly on the plant, and studies have shown that as much as 90% of its diet comes from vegetarian sources.

Bagheera kiplingi feasting on a Beltian body. How could you not love that face? Image credit: Robert L. Curry. Upon my arrival, I thought that acacia trees would be everywhere, and from what I thought I'd seen at the airport, I'd believed I was right. And therein lies the first mistake I made while searching for Bagheera--what appears to be the plant you are looking for can be easily misidentified.

Leucaea leucocephala, the plant I'd originally believed to be Vachellia collinsii. Note the lack of thorns. As it turned out, finding Vachellia collinsii with Bagheera kiplingi living on it turned out to be more difficult than I'd originally believed.

Why spiders?

Image credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leiocephalus-personatus-maskenleguan.jpg

Those who know me well can tell you that my first animals of interest were reptiles, especially lizards, which I've kept ever since I was in fifth grade. As time went on, I graduated from small lizards like the curly-tailed lizard (Leiocephalus personatus--the image above)to larger species such as tupinambis merianae (that's me holding my all-time favorite below).

I've even had plenty of snakes in my time, and I considered it my personal mission to save as many snakes as I could while working for two years in the Peace Corps in Panama. Here's one of my nicest snakes, an albino sunglow boa constrictor.

But like most people, I used to have a strong aversion to creatures with eight legs. Even while in the Peace Corps, I'd get the chills whenever I found a tarantula in my house (which happened at least four times, if not more). Scorpions also weren't high on my list of favorites, since I was stung two times by scorpions in Panama. Things started to change, however, when one of my friends in the mountain village where I was stationed showed me a scorpion that he was holding in his hands. He claimed that he'd somehow "deactivated" the stinging muscles, and it allowed him to hold the scorpion without any difficulty. Determined as I was to teach people in that small, rural, Panamanian community not to fear certain animals (snakes, especially), I was taken that this man, who'd killed at least two snakes during my time in Panama, fearlessly manipulated an animal that I secretly loathed. From that point forward, I made a promise to myself that I would not only defend the reptiles close to my heart, but I would try to protect predators in general. Now of course, I wasn't perfect in my goal, since there were very aggressive and poisonous snakes (Bothrops asper, in particular) that I could not successfully defend. Yet I did save at least three boa constrictors from early deaths, all three of which I released back into the wild in places where (hopefully) they were never disturbed.

Bothrops asper, the only mean (and potentially dangerous) snake that I found in Panama. Image credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bothrops_asper_(Panama)_head.jpg On the topic of spiders and scorpions, my efforts at appreciating their beauty came with a bit more difficulty. So once I returned to the United States, I purchased my first spider in 2007. She was a Chilean rose hair tarantula (Grammostola rosea, like the one below:

Image credit: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grammostola_rosea_adult_weiblich.jpg When I first opened her container, the old shudders returned. But (carefully) I let her crawl out onto my hand. She did not bite, she did not run up my arm to my face, and she did not release hairs from her abdomen to make my skin itch. All she did was sit there, and my appreciation for spiders grew slightly. In the coming months, I started handling her regularly and finally started to appreciate her gentle nature and beautiful, pink-and-brown coloration. My kids even got into the act, and I still recall the first time my daughter allowed the tarantula to crawl on her hand.

Another Grammostola rosea. You see? They aren't so bad after all! Image source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grammostola_rosa.jpg Given my success in warming up to at least one arachnid, I purchased a black emperor scorpion (Pandinus imperator) in 2012. I was not as successful in my attempts at scorpion husbandry, and it passed away last spring. The experience nevertheless gave me a new fondness for scorpions, and this particular specimen never tried to sting me. Since they are known to be one of the more docile species,even sitting in people's mouths for extended periods of time (see below) I guess this should not be a surprise.

An adult Pandinus imperator. Would you want to put this in your mouth? Image source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pandinus-imperator-6609.jpg Also in 2012, I gained my first experience with my favorite of all arachnids, the jumping spider. Of course, jumping spiders do not all belong to one species, they are among the most diverse group of spiders with more than 5,000 different types. The first one I found was a Phidippus audax, or bold jumping spider, that was crawling on the ceiling of my classroom.

With a face like that, who couldn't resist? It also turned out that this particular spider was easy to keep in a glass jar covered with a paper towel. All he needed was a spritz of water every few days, and a regular diet of fruit flies. He also lived up to his name as the "bold" jumping spider, since he was the first spider to ever bite me:

Did it hurt? Yes, it hurt a little, but no more than a bee sting. And I was asking for trouble, too, taking his picture without permission. Now I neglected to mention that back in 2009 I also happened to see an article on Yahoo! news about a spider that ate plants. It was the first of its kind ever discovered, and while I did think the discovery was fascinating, I didn't really follow up to learn more. In hindsight, the species is named Bagheera kiplingi (note the title of my blog), and several great photographs, videos, and articles may be found here. As it turned out, I started my M.S. (Master of Science) degree in biology at Villanova University in the fall of 2012, and Dr. Curry himself came to discuss his research on both birds (chickadees among them) and the vegetarian jumping spider he co-discovered. Needless to say, memories flickered about what I'd read several years before, and I figured that the hand of destiny must be at work. I decided that Bagheera kiplingi would be the focus of my master's thesis, especially after it became clear that one other species in the Bagheera genus lived in the U.S. So here I am, traveling across the United States, Mexico, and Central America, searching for Bagheera wherever I go.