Photos and text by Bryan Watts

In January 2011 Bryan Watts and Lesley Bullock led a class from Virginia Commonwealth University to the upper Bay of Panama for 10 days to expose the students to tropical ecosystems and the challenges of real-world conservation. Like a mission trip, the students conducted fieldwork with mangrove and mudflat bird communities with the intent of contributing to information vital to local conservation efforts. In addition to daily fieldwork, students had the opportunity to experience several other locations and natural communities.