Day 4: Mucho Mongoose dem!

Another glorious day in paradise! I woke up around 7:45 this morning, had breakfast and took a dip in the sea. After breakfast, Buzz, Katie and Matt went to the St. Croix campus of the University of the Virgin Islands to make some contacts with people in the Biology Department while I watched Jonathan, although he spent most of the time with Charlie. While everybody was gone I did some grading; after a while it started to rain (hard) and so Jonathan and Charlie came inside. They got bored after a while and asked me to turn on the TV and so I had to grade while they listened to "SpongeBob Squarepants". Fortunately Buzz, Matt and Katie came back soon after that and saved me.

We had lunch and then Matt, Karie and I went to the refuge to check traps. We had quite a haul! 10 mongoose dem! ("Mongoose dem" is the local plural for mongoose.) We also found a trap from last year. We brought them back and began examining them. We only had 3 recaptures; 8 males, one of which was not quite a full adult (but very close); in addition one of the two females was pregnant and Katie (who is a vet tech) estimated she was 2 or 3 weeks from giving birth. Most of the mongoose dem were really angry and spitting, growling and barking at us the whole time. Matt and I stayed with Jonathan while Buzz and Katie released the mongoose back at the refuge. I took this time to take a swim while Matt played with Jonathan. After my swim I read for a bit until Buzz and Katie returned.

We then drove into Fredericksted to go to this gift shop that had great shirts for cheap prices. I bought several shirts and other things, as did everybody else. We then came back to the cottages for a dinner of steak and fried squid. I've never had fried squid before and it was ok, though a bit too fishy for me.

It's now 8:45pm and I'm getting tired so I'll read for a bit and then head off to bed. Tomorrow we do a computer link up, using Skype, with Jonathan's kindergarten class. Two local students will be joining us, as will Mike, the head of the refuge, and Claudia who also works at the refuge. This should be very cool and I've been really looking forward to this part of the trip.