In case you were interested,
The trip to South America is thanks to the National Science Foundation (NSF) grant that we recieved and the support of Southwestern University (SU). I will be one of three students from SU and two more students will be joinging us from the University of Hawaii! We will be part of the AMPLIFIED team (Ampullariidae Model using Phylogeography Laboratory Integration with Field Investigations into Ecology and Diversity).
The snails I will be primarily reasearching is Pomacea maculata an invasive species here in the United States that is native to South America. I will also be looking at P. megastoma a sister species of P. maculata that is not invasive and so far has only been found in South America, mostly in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. There is very little information documentated for either of these snails but especially for P. megastoma. I will be experimenting with these snails at the hatchling stage (fresh from the eggs!) and looking at their comparisons and differences in order to understand their life cycles and trophic interactions.
I want to look at Loricariidae (catfish) while I am there to see if they are a possible predator of the snail because we have catfish native here (in the US) and they appear native in the same water systems as the snails. There have been studies that say they eat mussels in Brazil but I have not found any that specifcially look at predation of snails.
I have posted more pics of the snails in a folder "Snails, Snails, and More Snails!" if you'd like to take a look!
14 Hours to Departure! =D
ErraticallyAbstract
