Friday, 30 October, 2:30pm, in Antigua Guatemala, is the first of eight lectures by eight different archaeologists, zoologists, botanists, and cave explorer. Dr Nicholas Hellmuth is the first speaker.
It is natural to assume that sharks are marine creatures, especially when you are swimming on a beach! But in Mexico and Guatemala, one species of deadly shark swims far up the Rio Usumacinta and on the other coast swims up the Rio Dulce and Lake Izabal.
So we hope to see you at 2:30 pm in Antigua Guatemala (Cooperacion Espanola, one block from main plaza, organized by Fundacion La Ruta Maya).
If you can’t make the lecture, we can provide the lecture to you if you can help us obtain an underwater camera case for our Nikon D810. Either a Subal ND810, or Nauticam NA-D810, or Sea & Sea MDX-D810 underwater housing. In return for a (tax deductible donation) we would provide a copy of the PhD dissertation of Dr Hellmuth PLUS the entire PowerPoint presentation.
It would also help our future research to have an Olympus TG-4 underwater point-and-shoot camera for our assistants (much easier to use than a DSLR when you are faced with a shark!). In return for a donation for this camera we would provide the entire PowerPoint presentation.
If you would like these or any of other archaeology, flora or fauna lectures by Dr Nicholas, in-person, in your home town, anywhere in the world, a donation for the underwater housing + airfare to you city (and a hotel to stay) he can lecture to you, your friends and family; or at a local club, school, or association that you belong to. He can lecture in English, Spanish, or German.
Fundacion La Ruta Maya has invited Dr Hellmuth to give two lectures in Antigua Guatemala: Oct 23rd in the evening; and Oct 30th in early afternoon. Both topics will be on the iconography and cosmology of water-related symbolism. So we went on another field trip to a water eco-system in Peten to do more documentation for these lectures.
Examples of water lilies blooming underwater, Arroyo Pucte (Rio de la Pasion, Sayaxche) and Canal de Chiquimulilla (Monterrico). All this will be discussed and explained during the presentation Oct 23rd, Antigua Guatemala.
The focus of the evening lecture is on water lily eco-systems, both above water and underwater. This is because a percentage of these plants bloom underwater; these flowers never reach above the surface. Botanists said this was not true, so we went underwater to record this “impossible” botanical situation.
Three flowers which grow in the swamps alongside the Rio San Pedro Martyr, with water lilies blooming in the river in front of them.
But the full-color presentation Oct 23rd will showcase all the other beautiful flowering plants which thrive on the shore facing the water lilies in the river. Of these, an unexpected discovery is a 4-petaled flower.
4-petaled flowers are pictured in Late Classic (Tepeu 2) vases, bowls, and plates of Tikal, Uaxactun and neighboring Mayan ruins of Guatemala. Nicholas found several bowls and vases with 4-petaled flowers in the Tomb of the Jade Jaguar which he discovered in Tikal in 1965. No botanist nor archaeologist that we are aware of was able to identify which species of flower was represented until Dr Hellmuth spent three years searching throughout Guatemala to document every single solitary 4-petaled flower that exists.
It turns out that the most common 4-petaled flower grows in the same eco-system as water-lilies (along the Rio San Pedro Martyr in front of Las Guacamayas Biological Station).
If you would like to bring Dr Nicholas Hellmuth to your city (anywhere in the world) he can lecture in Spanish, English, or German (or his PowerPoint can be translated for a local audience into any other language).
E-mail us at FrontDesk “at” FLAAR.org to fly Dr Hellmuth to your city. He can also lecture on the Tomb of the Jade Jaguar of Tikal, on the Sacred Rubber Ballgames of the Maya and Aztec, on medicinal plants of the Maya, and on plants used for dye colorants for Maya clothing.
Smilax species flowers (tough, as this vine flowers high in tall trees)
and Curatella Americana in bloom, chaparal.
So far in the first five months we reached several of these goals: we found Curatella americana in its literally last days of blooming for 2015.
A team of our two botany students found one species of magnolia in bloom, Magnolia quetzal, on a remote mountain slope.
one of our plant scouts found Guapinol near Parque Lachua, but it had mature seed pods (insides are edible). So we need to learn when it will bloom in 2016.
Updated May 2015
Posted the last days of December 2014 as preparation for 2015.
On Christmas day 2014 we were photographing the pretty lavender flowers of achiote, Bixa orellana, in a remote area of Alta Verapaz. Two days later we reached the cacao areas of the Boca Costa (piedmont and initial hills before the higher mountain ranges) and Costa Sur (flatlands).
We also continue to study plants which produce dye colorants for Maya clothing. Several scholars in Guatemala have published on dye colorants. Our contribution is to find and photograph each species in high resolution.
And we will also keep on searching for medicinal plants. We appreciate the cooperation of medical biologist Armando Caceres in this work; we want to photograph the flowers and eco-system of all medicinal plants of the Maya. The lists already exist; what is lacking is a coffee-table quality and quantity of photographs of the actual remarkable medicinal plants.
Plus we wish to encourage local people to consider a better diet of more fruits and more vegetables (in other words, to learn more about the foods of their ancestors).
Also we would like to do projects with international agencies, on how to provide employment in rural areas, by creating clever items from natural plant products to sell to tourists in Guatemala City, Lake Atitlan, Chichicastenango, Tikal, etc. We already have a list of what local, native, Mayan plants and trees could be used.
As soon as donations, contributions, or grants allow us to obtain a 4WD double-cabin Toyota or Madza pickup (or Ford F250 of comparable size) we can achieve more. Plus it would help to have access to
Schneider Xenon f1.6, 35 mm lens (for photographing trees)
Zeiss Otis f1.4, 55mm lens (for photographing trees out in a field),
Schneider Macro Symmar f2.4, 85mm, for high-res close-ups of flowers
a Canon EF 500mm f/4.0L IS II USM prime telephoto lens (for photographing flowers and fruits high in trees, or a tree which is across a creek or on the other side of a narrow canyon).
Plus one really high-power PC and one fully-equipped Mac to handle high-resolution photographs (here at FLAAR we use both Mac and PC, since some software prefers one or the other).
Posted the last days of December 2014 as preparation for 2015
"Flor de Muerto" is a marigold flower which is used to decorate the graves of deceased relatives. Millions of people in Latin America (and elsewhere) celebrate the first days of November by honoring their dead relatives. Flowers are placed on the graves.
Marigold flowers are the primary flower, but each year more plastic flowers are used, or cheap flowers spray painted with bright chemical colors. So we are trying to find and photograph Mayan areas of Guatemala where actual native flowers are still used.
Marigolds come in many sizes and shapes; most are yellow but other colors occur. Several species provide a yellow dye colorant (to color food or to color cloth). Some marigolds have rather potent chemical composition, especially Tagetes lucida (a species whose flower is very different in size and shape than the larger daisy-like marigold flowers).
The name "flor de Muerto" is used for almost any marigold but I estimate is most appropriate for the medium sized flower with closely bunched petals. And usually darkish colors rather than all bright yellow.
Flor de Muerto, Maya flowers for deceased relatives
Whenever we find seeds of medicinal plants we bring them back to our ethnobotanical garden to plant them. So year by year we gradually have a diverse variety of medicinal plants growing around our office.
The importance of having the plants at the office is so we can photograph their flowers. Plus, if the plants are growing on the porch in front of my desk, it is a lot easier to notice in which month the plant is blooming (than trying to find the same plant blooming out in the fields and forests of remote parts of Guatemala).
The reason for photographing the flowers is to help in accurate identification of the plants. Also, most medicinal plants have not been photographed with high-resolution cameras nor with good lighting techniques. So the photographs from the FLAAR team of photographers can assist all those who welcome documentation of rare and endangered species of Mesoamerica
Passiflora quadrangularis, Badea. Fruit in our garden used for seed
