For the first time, the size of the palms living in the basement of California is alive with the camera for the first time.
Three undergraduate students came up with an idea to capture the indigenous rhilish mount in the East Cierlanbada area as part of the project in the fall of 2024. Vishal Subramanyan, Prakrit Jain, and Harper Forbes lay out more than 100 traps last November and checked them to shoot small creatures for three days every two hours.
“The most difficult part to take a picture is that they are always running around, so it’s incredibly fast,” Subramanyan told CBS News.
Vishal Subramanyan
Another reason that Linelgears mount had never been captured on the camera was that they had very fast metabolism, said SUBRAMANYAN. When he knew that this specific animal had never been taken before, he had already taken photos of small mammals for mammals classes.
Researchers have set a similar pitfall trap to catch the rat, but if they are left in the trap for more than two hours, they will simply be starving. Therefore, SUBRAMANYAN, Jain, and Forbes had to check the trap every two hours.
To take a picture, students can set a white background at the bottom of the box and take pictures using glass at the top. They also had a terrarium with soil and meals for the rat.
Vishal Subramanyan
Small mammals are active day and night, as they must eat insects and spiders constantly to survive. Another task for taking pictures was a cold finger, said Subramagnan.
During the expedition provided by the help of the CAL Academy, the temperature of the mountain dropped to 15 degrees. SUBRAMANYAN was part of the organization’s California Creators for Nature program aimed at attracting people to social media in conversations on nature, climate, and environmental justice.
“In the United States, a considerable number of animals have never taken pictures, there are few low -quality photos, and there are no low -quality photos,” said Jain. He added that he wanted to keep taking pictures of living things.
According to UC BERKELEY, in addition to estimating habitat loss by 89 % by the 2080s and raising awareness of small mammals facing threats from climate change, students are photos in scientific databases. It is easy for researchers to identify the rat seeds, saying they will be input.
Jein said that the rat was a “very multiple predators” and can eat several times every day. He also pointed out that they were also useful as an important part of the food chain for other predators, such as snakes, owls, and wild cats.
