anna1

Well folks, it’s that time of year again, when courses are complete, the campus is void of undergraduates, and the focus has shifted to field work. While elsewhere across the nation the leaves are out and the weather is ever becoming more summer-like, here in Newfoundland we haven’t quite made it there. And as a plant ecologist, waiting for growing season can be a little tiresome.

This past April, I handed in my last term paper and began to wonder about my field site. I had been reading and thinking about the role snow may have on conifer germination and seedling survival, and had the urge to go check out my research site and conduct snow depth measurements. I got the OK from my supervisor, quickly planned a weekend trip to King’s Point (in Newfoundland), and instantly got nervous that I was going to get there and find no snow to measure. I mean, after all it was the end of April. Well those were famous last words. I got to the trailhead to be met with an unbroken trail covered with about a meter of snow. As we were lacing up our boots, a local pulled over and said “You hiking the trail?! I hope you have your garbage can lids.” We unfortunately didn’t have snow shoes which made for a tiring yet fun and adventurous couple days, and really what more can you ask from field work.

I think a lot of us in graduate school were involved in research as undergraduates. For me, the experiences I had shaped what I wanted to research and made me confident in my decision to pursue graduate studies. For the most part, my involvement surrounded the data collection part of research, as is often the case with undergraduate research positions. Data collection is still my favourite part of research. Although for me it often involves some bug bites and carrying (what some may say are) strange things into the forest. All the same, data collection is the first big step towards deciphering your research question.  While as undergraduates, we most often were assigned repetitive tasks like weighing samples or data entry, which we did most likely blissfully unaware of the amount of time that the graduate student had dedicated prior to our involvement.

Preparing for field work is parallel to the saying “measure twice and cut once”, you want to double check you that 1) you have everything you need and 2) that it is all in good working condition before you get to your field site, ready to work. Of course the degree of nuisance of not having something is dependent on the isolation of your site. It has been a busy few days of “measuring things twice” as I get ready for my next field trip. Cross your fingers that the handful of warm days since I was last out there has been enough to get the plants growing (and for me to be done with snow!). I’ll keep you updated!

Till next time,

~Anna