Cue creepy Jaws music....

Hello! Drawing ever closer to the deadline, a feeling of urgency is creeping into my work, together with a nervousness that I still haven't completed any GIS maps. Going out on the boat is a great stress reliever, and our encounters continue to be memorable. Two days ago, 5 miles into the North sea, we spotted a fin shape moving through the water, but it wasn't moving like cetacean. To our complete shock and amazement, we had stumbled across a shark! Only two and half metres long but a shark nonetheless. We didn't get good enough photos to clearly identify it, but we think it was probably a porbeagle (possibly a mako). It stuck around for about half an hour, fishing at the surface before disappearing. It left us completely in awe (and made us all think twice about sitting with our legs dangling over the edge of the boat in the future). Hope all goes well, see you soon!

Jenny

Data: sweaty, sweaty data

Thought it was about time i let the world know how my life is at the moment, you lucky, lucky people...

So my time at the Zoo has been fun, good to catch up with old friends and giggling like a school boy with my supervisor about "Boning" my way across the US. But not I am in America and it a whole different country.

My flight was textbook, surrounded by a family that were hell bent on not leaving me in peace wanting to talk, walk and indeed scamper over my seat due to their excitement at flying into Orlando and presumably Disney world etc. yay.

The bus journey after was interesting. A diverse set of highway signs leaving me with the impression that Floridians are obsessed with real estate, abortion, various arrangements of meat, and the size of their alligators.

My arrival in Gainesville was pretty late but i got to my hotel to find the biggest bed ever conceived by man, which was a welcome sight as the next day i was up at the crack of dawn to start my boning....

So it turns out, that they have moved the collection of fossils for my study out of the museum collection proper to a storage facility located on the outskirts of town near a bowling alley called "Alleycatz", which seems to be busy at all times of the day. The facility is teeming with crazy fossil specimens and casts of Dire Wolf jaws, whale skulls etc. However, I have been told to keep a low profile, and this combined with my supervisors desire to have me bring back some sloths in my suitcase makes me think i may be involved in an international fossil smuggling operation and am some kind of patsie.

Right, so i have to get back to boning now. So many fossils, so little time. Hope all of you are having a great time. I look forward to seeing you all.

J

Amphibian antics

Bit of an update from me...

As those of you who I've grumbled at will know, I've had to abandon all French fieldwork plans as there are just no tadpoles around for me to monitor at the fieldsites in the Pyrenees due to a freakishly cold winter/spring. So, instead of a rousing hike up to a montane lake to do my work, its now a sweaty commute on the tube to a ridiculously hot lab! Not quite the same. But the opportunity to see gorillas, komodo dragons or oh-so-creepy slender lorises at lunchtime compensates to some extent! (as does the subsidised bar...).

I'm still doing a project which is looking at chytrid disease in amphibians, but now its abit more about why in some areas the disease wipes out whole populations whereas in others they persist relatively unaffected. Its pretty interesting stuff but the associated evolutionary biology is hurting my brain quite alot!! Its been quite slow progress getting on with the lab work as I'm still waiting for samples (...*cough* dead tadpoles...) to do PCRs on, so I probably won't have my data together til August (the organised person within is starting to panic!) but I'm making slow but sure progress with the write up while I've got some time. I even shocked myself today by playing with some dummy data in R - Olivier would be proud!

So, other than the lengthy commute, things are going OK. Even if I am bitter than I'm not amongst eagles or marmots in the Pyrenees, or crayfish in the Yorkshire Dales, or cetaceans in Scotland, or Lyme disease in...OK, you get the picture!

Great hearing what everyone else is up to!

L

A better shot of our awesome whale encounter. Kevin had just told me that day that minke whales rarely breach. This female begged to differ.

If you go down to the woods tonight...

So I've been here at The Forest for a while and it's not too bad. Nestled in a gorgeous summer it's beautiful oak woodland full of butterflies and deer and lyme's disease which I am perhaps a bit too cavalier about as there seems to be a mini-epidemic of it at the research station this summer, my supervisor showing me the 'scar' of it that he needs to get his antibiotics for.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to spend too much time in The Forest catching lyme's disease seeing as I oh-so-cleverly arranged to borrow the mobile lab which I'm not going to have for another month. This means I am spending quite alot of time sitting in a cupboard writing the best god-damned introduction ever written, trying to make what I'm going to be doing seem both 1) new and 2) useful, (probably failing at both) and coming down from the hubris of thinking I actually understood [R]. The fruit of my five-odd weeks here so far is having finally ordered some plastic pots to cut up and crudely fix around trees which over the next few weeks I will no doubt have to explain to the ramblers looking at the pretty butterflies, unaware that Lymes Disease walks amoung them, laying its victims low like when Night falls in Palermo.

I am also finding it difficult to adjust to having free time. The town I'm staying in is big enough to make me think I could be doing something with myself but small enough for there to be nothing to do.

Ah well. 'least it's sunny!

-R

Crayfish and shiz...

Hi guys and girls,

I thought it might be my turn to update you all on the status of white-clawed crayfish in the Yorkshire Dales! To be honest, it has been a sloooow process. I arrived by train to a town called Skipton four weeks ago, where I was kindly picked up by one of the guys from the national trust. I was driven to a hamlet in the middle of nowhere, and I stayed for 3.5 weeks. I had a... "Here is a valley, find us some crayfish" moment and that was it... I was alone in a valley with streams that needed sampling. Some are 12 miles away and I have a push bike. Fabulous.

I have literally spent everyday for the past 3 weeks measuring stones and manually searching for crayfish with no luck. Today however I found looooads :-) Also amazing. I was measuring one today and I put it in a bucket for like 2 minutes, and its eggs hatched and I had 1 mummy crayfish and five babies. They are tiny, about half the size of your little finger nail. I have photos, but they are so small and transparent you almost can't see them.

Im not gonna lie, it's wierd watching both the world cup and wimbeldon by yourself. But this week I am in a village that has both roads AND pavement, and a pub open past 9.30. I'm sharing a dorm with 4 blokes tho, and they snore like thunder. Suppose you can't have it all!

The place is gorgeous, green is everywhere, as are sheep, cows and tourists. I have loads of pictures of it too, but after a few they all start looking the same.

I hope everyone is good. I loveee being able to read about what everyone is up to. Good idea Lucy!

Much love

Nic xxx

p.s. you can almost see the baby crayfish in the top right photo...

Paradise

Hello from the Seychelles!!! I am currently sitting underneath a coconut tree on the beach and relishing my new found connection to the outside world!!

As you can see its beautiful here, the day I arrive I was pretty knackared and as I got off the

plane the 80% humidity hit me - seriously I am never dry!

Any hoo I have been swimming in them the oceans, and its like having a warm bath, no umming and erring, dipping my toes in first. Floating has become my favourite past time.

A couple of days later I went up to the jungle, It was an absolutely grueling walk, 2-3 hours scrabling up hill side. Its so difficult to breath too because of the humidity but worth it, it was an amazing wilderness... Saw snakes, spiders, giant millipedes and those damn tiny frogs... They look exactly like little bits of leaf, damn, that's my project down the drain....

Any hoo hope everyone is enjoying their projects and enjoying the release from 24 hour working days that this placement hopefully holds!

Soph xx

Celeb spot of the week

Today at the zoo: Jedward! Last week at the zoo: Sporty Spice!

More London Zoo celebrity sightings next week :-)

Hello! Finally got round to uploading some photos. None taken by me by the way, my nature photography skills aren't at the stage where I can photograph dolphins from a moving boat. They were all taken by my supervisor Kevin Robinson. These encounters happened just over a week ago. The female in the photo with the calf is called Panda, and the baby is called Swayze. Swayze has a spinal deformation, which may be the result of numerous factors potentially including attacks by adult male dolphins, but he's gloriously playful, and often bow-rides with us when we meet him. The juvenile on its own is Pirate. And the other picture is the wonderful minke whale which leapt six or so times right out of the water, then followed us out of curiosity for a while. Absolutely incredible experience, to see such a massive creature breach like that, and according to Kevin it's really rare behaviour. As for my project, ArcGIS is finally installed on my laptop and I start analysis tomorrow. I can't wait, it's a fascinating topic, I just hope I fare well with the software... J

Hello!
I hope everyone is enjoying their respective places/placements. I don't have that much to blog about really but thought I would anyway since I'm wasting time in the library before for the England match.
So far I've been growing plants and insects and trying to stop both from dying. The insectary where I work is really cool with lots of strange creatures and peoples pets including a goliath bird eating tarantula which gives me the creeps every time I see it. Its a high containment area so I have to change lab coats about a zillion times before I can get to where my insects are kept. I'm working on disease transmission in leafhoppers, and they are sooo cute! I had to dissect some the other day and I felt really guilty. I'm gonna be doing more insect murder tomorrow and one from outside jumped in my soup today so thats quite alot of insect lives I've ruined!
Ive set up a preliminary experiment while I'm waiting for things to grow and have started collecting saliva for analysis. I haven't learnt alot of the techniques I will be using yet as people have been away etc so I' mostly just plodding along slowly and enjoying their swimming pool. They also have tennis courts etc, amazing!
I'm loving the sunny weather, I hope it stays this way!
Kellyx

Wild Scottish Coast

Hello! After many trials (and a little help from Lucy) I have finally figured out how to add posts. So I've been in Gardenstown for just over a week, the analysis side of my project won't start officially for at least another two weeks; at the moment I'm enjoying the scenery, learning field techniques, collecting data and playing games with the rest of the team.

We have a gannet colony not far from us which nest high enough on the cliffs that they are easily visible from the footpaths, and we've encountered a number of curious grey seals from the boat and in the harbour. The house I'm staying in is built onto the seawall, and the water comes within feet of my window at high tide. The place is beautiful.

Big news today: wild dolphins!!!! It's the second time we've been out on the boat due to rough weather, and we came across a group of 30+ dolphins with calves!! I can't do the experience justice in words, it was absolutely magic. One of them, a female called Aye Aye, was bow-surfing with us for a while and I could see her clear through the water. And the babies were really playful, two of them chased the boat for a while. We observed hunting behaviour with adults leaping out of the water and throwing fish, and some aggression; dolphins are quite vicious, some males have even been known to kill calves. They weren't in a tight group but spread out so that there were dolphins in every direction we looked. We were with them for about an hour.

Going out on the boat again tomorrow for longer, hopefully they'll still be around. Absolutely buzzing from the experience. We record encounters which will then be mapped (by me) using GIS (if I can EVER get it to work) to see how dolphins use the area.

Goodnight from Gardenstown. X

Ice ice baby

Here is a photo of one of my fieldsites. Despite being mid June, it is mostly frozen and tadpole-less. This would probably not be referred to as 'optimum conditions' for an experiment requiring tadpoles. Perhaps I shouldn't have laughed so much about Kelly Redeker's concerns about hypothermia...

Anyway, hoping to be at said lake in about a week or so, hunting for tadpoles like my MRes depends on it.

Other than that, all's well at IoZ and I'm becoming a pro at DNA extraction!

Lucy

Preliminary goat report

INTRODUCTION
Fera take advantage of unsuspecting students to do the jobs they couldn't persuade their paid staff to do. This includes staring at goats in Wales.

METHODS
The first week was spent goat-viewing in the blazing sunshine. The second week was spent goat-hating in sporadic rain.

RESULTS
After day one of week one: extreme sunstroke produced vomitosis and bed-riddenness. Following recovery from this, excessive walking in wet boots generated red raw feet (with risk of gangrene).

DISCUSSION
Complete disregard for the elements seems to result in suffering. Recommendations for future work include the use of a hat, suncream, and three pairs of socks.



ps... is this blog still public?? Louise x

Aussie Update :)

Hello!!

Hope you're all well and placements are going ok. Just thought I'd update you all on how I'm doing!

Got to Brisbane a week ago - my pilot dad flew me & my mum here (on a normal scheduled flight!!)so I spent the first two nights in luxury in the hotel the crew stay at. They returned to Brunei pretty swiftly as my dad was working again and I moved in with a friend of a friend of Lucy's (slightly tenuous link!!) who was a postdoc at York and now is working at UQ. They live only 10 minutes walk away from the Uni which was really handy. Turns out Karen and her boyfriend are really nice people and helped me loads in my first week.

I spent the first week travelling by the glamorous City Cat into the city to the State Library to use the internet to find longterm places to stay. I saw some pretty special places - one where my potential housemates were total stoners and didn't know what time of day it was. I've now found a place about 10 minutes walk from Uni that's nice and quiet, with superfast broadband (pretty difficult to find in Australia!!) and a pretty large room which I'm happy about :)

Work at uni has gone well so far - the lab is pretty cool - it's got an aquarium in it (with only sustainable flora & fauna - i.e. not wild-caught - it's all been captive-bred prrreeettty cool!). This week I've been removing otoliths from fish (earbones) which is quite hard, but makes me feel like a keyhole surgeon from Grey's Anatomy as it's all done under the microscope with tiny tweezers! The otoliths will all be sent off to an otolith consultant (pretty random job!) who'll count the rings on them so the fish can be aged (they grow a new ring of calcium carbonate in the otolith - a bit like trees). I'll be looking at the parasites (there aren't actually that many) when all the ears are removed!

This weekend is a long weekend - for the Queen's Birthday! We don't get a holiday in the UK!! I'm going to head to Byron Bay as there should be epic waves for surfings :)

Anywhoo....hope you're all well, and get posting!! I don't want to be the only one to post stuff :)

Genevieve xxxxx

Testing the blog!

Naturally, as a scientist (and a relative newcomer to the world of blogging, unlike Ms Davis) I am just adding this to make sure it works! Hope that you will all read/add to this over the next few months, I think it'll be a great way to post photos and news of what we're all up to - be it the quirks of the odd new people we're living/working with, the trials and tribulations of catching frogs the size of your thumbnail in the Seychelles or the whereabouts of Richard and "The Mobile Lab".

Feel free to add updates!

L