Today we climbed higher into the Luquillo mountains – all the way to the top of Pico El Yunque. At these elevations the tabonuco rainforest (named for the dominant species, Dacryodes excelsa – more on this another post) transitions into cloud forest and elfin forest. At these elevations the forest is always in the clouds, so…

What is the fate of dead wood and fallen leaves? A large fraction of a forest’s carbon is stored in these materials at any given time. But this dead material does not continually accrete – it is transformed into other forms by decomposers, and made available to other organisms. Large logs may last for only…

Understanding a rainforest by only walking through it is like visiting a new city but never leaving the tourist spots. You have only seen it from one perspective, when many others are available. The canopy of a forest can be an entirely different world. But how to get up to it, when the tallest trees…

Sunday morning, and we’re off to work. We put on our rubber boots and rain gear, gather equipment for the day, and walk a short twenty meters to the edge of the forest. From here, it is a half kilometer hike through the mud and roots to our first field site. To reach it, we…