Costa Rica | Family Rainforest Camp Extension: Butterflies and Beaches

About this trip

Continue your Family Rainforest Camp experience in the Guanacaste region of northwestern Costa Rica! See where the Museum’s butterfly pupae are raised at El Bosque Nuevo and observe bioluminescence on the Pacific Coast.

This enriching program is for families with children ages 5-17. Minors should be accompanied by at least one parent or guardian. Participants will be divided into appropriate age groups for activities and workshops.

Highlights

• Visit the greenhouses at El Bosque Nuevo to witness the butterfly breeding process and each stage of metamorphosis.
• Learn about local insects, animals, and plants during a guided hike.
• Use a black light to observe a wide range of insect specimens after dark.
• Observe the phenomenon of bioluminescence at Playa Rajada on the Pacific Coast.

Meet your leader

Dr. David Blackburn

Dave Blackburn is the Curator of Herpetology in the Florida Museum of Natural History. In his role at the Florida Museum, Dave oversees research and curation of the museum’s scientific collection of amphibians and reptiles, which is among the top 10 of such collections in the US and the largest in the southeastern US.  After completing college at the University of Chicago, he did his PhD at Harvard University, followed by three years as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Kansas and then four years as a curator at the California Academy of Sciences. The research by Dave and his students focuses on the diversity, evolution, and conservation of amphibians and reptiles. To date, he has described 27 new species of frogs from Africa, South America, and Asia. Dave's work has been featured in the New York Times, National Geographic, the magazine Science, the children’s book “When Lunch Fights Back” by Rebecca Johnson, and Christopher Kemp’s recent book “The Lost Species.”