It was really hot today, so after soldering my LED's (which later broke for some unknown reason), we got jiao zi for lunch and picked up some hats over at the market. One of my 3 cameras is still not working and we're going to try to blow the sand out of it tomorrow.
Then we went and set up the enclosure and set traps out behind the Kazakh's field station. It was just us 3 American girls and the taxi driver, so when Kim and Sarah went to set traps, the taxi driver came to help me with the fence! I made sure to get Yang Chiang to tell him that it's fiberglass and it will give him splinters, so he knew he had to wear gloves. Otherwise, with my extremely broken Chinese abilities and a little scherades, we built a magnificent enclosure! He even designed a working door for us to get in and out. I asked him his name to acknowledge him in my publications, and he wrote it in the sand for me. On the way back we tried to get him to tell us what sounds the animals make, but he really really didn't want to sound silly.
Also, Sarah and Kim found an awesome lizard! It curls its tail up like the Bahamas Curly Tailed lizard. It's some kind of Phrynocephalus agamid, but I haven't identified the species yet. Either axilliaris or versicolor. I'll post a video of its locomotion soon!
At night we set up a bunch of IR and headlamps and ran the animals. We found that it was best to put the lights on the ground instead of above the jerboa. The 5 toe guys are crazy amazing! I never thought I'd say this, but I can't wait to track this video tomorrow! Yang Chiang went off on the motorbike with the Chinese guy who catches our jerboas, and they caught 5 more!
The sad note of the night was that one of the 5 toed jerboas we caught last night died today. We have no idea what's wrong with her besides his tail being broken. She seemed super happy up to this afternoon. At least she will still be useful for genetics work.
When we came back to the field station, there were 2 boxes in the foyer that were moving. Each one was filled with 10 chickens! Guess we know what's on the menu for the next week or so!
Some wacky phrases we learned today: lu mao zi = (lit. to wear a green hat) cuckold.
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