Rainforest Live '97 Journals from Queensland, Australia

  From the week ending February 14, 1997

Rainforest Birds
by Rosemary Penna

My first couple of days in the rainforest have been very exciting and very busy. My time has been divided between getting to know my surroundings (the rainforest) and getting to know my group. The first striking thing I noticed about the rainforest beyond its beauty were the birds. Actually, I noticed the noisy birds the morning after I arrived. The morning chorus of the rainforest birds begins before dawn and it is a time when various birds call out to one another.

The second day, we broke up into small groups and went bird watching with binoculars. During that time, I tried to identify the birds by not only what they look like but by their calls as well. All of the birds activities during our orientation helped me understand this unique ecosystem where I will be living for the next three months.

Getting Started
by Michelle Machalka

To start things off, most of the students met at the airport in Los Angeles from our respective states. After spending 14 hours on the plane to Sydney and another 3 hours getting to Cairns we were all pretty excited to go for a swim as our first group outing in the SFS. In the following days, we met with a group planting a corridor, a strip of trees which provide wildlife with covered access from one rainforest to another. We spent a lot of time dealing with orientation, getting acquainted with the local birds, trees and edible fruits, learning about safety on the field and around campus, and being introduced to the academic aspect of our stay at the center. We've just started our classes in which afternoon field lectures in the rainforests provide excellent first-hand information. There doesn't seem to be a lot of extra time so far for individual or group hikes, but I am sure as the semester continues, making time for recreation in the rainforest will become a priority. After all, how often can you say that you're living in a tropical Utopia.

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