Kenya 1

Ok so this is way beyond tardy, but still...

Back at the end of January we got to go to Kenya on a field trip, which was one of the determining factors in choosing the course for every single student. I was still recovering from my infected insect bite, so was a bit spaced for most of the trip, but it still had a huge impact.

We visited 5 National Parks, seeing how conservation theory was put into practice. Although the validity of the trip was called into question more than once, ie whether it was worth the money, seeing how the communities were affected by conservation initiatives was invaluable, and is bound to be the part of the course that is most remembered. The first park we visited was Meru, famous for the work done there by George and Joy Adamson. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it did feel as if we were just safari tourists at times - we did two trips per day, spotting wildlife for species lists, but pretty much just observing as visitors. Meru was remote, with high vegetation, and elusive wildlife. We did see about 30 species of bird each trip, and lions, Dik diks, Water Buffalo, and other ungulates I can't really remember the name of.

It was quite difficult socially because we weren't allowed outside of the camping area, and had to share tents with people. There were quite a few loners pacing the perimeter. We had a surprising amount of free time during the day, and managed to catch things like a dung beetle rolling a dung ball, preparing to mate. Meru felt very wild, quite untamed and was beautiful. In retrospect, it was the favourite park of most people on the course.

Wadering

Ok, so maybe this is tad out of date, but everything has been more than a bit hectic!

I'll start with the project, which I've now started working on in earnest, but am being more than a bit disorganised about. My project is looking at Managed Realignment sites, which are areas of formerly reclaimed land which are being allowed to flood with seawater again. The idea is that saltmarsh is created, which dissipates some of the wave energy, and takes pressure off sea defences elsewhere along the coast. There haven't been many studies done, although there are lots of claims of the ecological benefits of doing this, and it can actually be used to create saltmarsh to mitigate for areas lost elswhere through development etc. The Government actually has a legal obligation to recreate certain habitats if they are lost through development, saltmarsh being one such.

So basically I'm doing lots of sunrise to sunset bird counts, identifying wader and waterbird species and qualifying what they're doing every half hour. Whilst doing this in Exeter in December, I got bitten by an unidentified insect, the bite got very infected and I ended up being quite ill. It happened just before the Kenya trip, so nearly didn't get to go.

The second part of the project involves doing transects to sample marine invertebrates, and then looking at the relationship between the invertebrate species found and the bird species found, and comparing both of those to unmanaged areas nearby, such as open estuary. I really like the idea of returning areas to their natural state, and trying to make up for some of the areas that have been lost. Essex has lost something like 90% of its saltmarsh, mainly through reclamation, and re-flooding the low grade agricultural land could be great for birds and for helping to cope with rising sea levels.

Newquay Zoo

Just a quick post about Newquay Zoo. We went there at the end of the Kew week, and again, it was an inspiring place. We had a day of discussions about the role of zoos in conservation and although the conclusion was that historically they haven't had a great deal of impact on conservation, this seems to be changing.

They have some great animals there, such as a Madagascan Fossa, and a couple of Sloths, and we had a talk from the zoo director who explained how they are funding in-situ projects.

It raised interesting questions about the value of keeping animals in captivity, of making things real for people so they were interested in saving them, about how best to have an educational impact and about whether local zoos should have local wildlife in them.

I'm still not sure what I think about them overall, but it was lovely to see some of the species at Newquay.

Kew

I meant to write this post last week, but what with stats practicals and wader research to be done, didn't quite get round to it!

The week before last, we spent 3 days at Kew Gardens, being shown round the Herbarium, the nursery, and sitting through a dizzying number of lectures and talks from an astonishingly enthusiastic staff. Everyone was passionate and so eager to talk to us and pass on information and experiences, it was quite surprising. I guess we had got used to having talks from slightly more guarded conservation professionals, warning us of the constant battles, the defeats and disappointments and trying to maintain their hope in the face of overwhelming human short-sightedness.

However, everyone in Kew was the total opposite, and I ended our time there thinking this was partly because they had only been involved in conservation for 10 years or so, but mainly because they could do so much towards conserving species, and teaching the government and the public about conservation. I hadn't expected the weight of the institution that is RBG Kew, but it is immense, the expertise that they have there is world-leading. The main reason I think though, was because they could actively grow endangered species at Kew, as well as preserving them in-situ, and work towards preserving genetic diversity long-term in the Millennium seedbank and their micro-propagation department. The latter is looking at doing amazing things with plant cell samples.

We learned about how the Lady's Slipper Orchid (Cypripedium calceolus) is being reintroduced to places in the UK, the work they are doing in the UK Overseas Territories, the Plant Conservation Strategy, and the amazing stats, such as how Kew aims to have 10% of all the world's flowering species conserved in the seed bank, and how they already have 7 million herbarium samples.

It is by far the most affecting thing we have done on the course, and the calm confidence that the staff had in the importance of their work, and the ability of the general populace to appreciate that was truly inspiring.

Thank you Kew!

Conservation - to do a little...

This week has been full of conservation, with the practice at the beginning of the week, and the theory at the end.

On Monday, we had our first full field day out, and our first encouter with local Cornish conservation. We were taken to three Cornwall Wildlife Trust sites, a managed wood, a heathland site, and some beautiful vegetated sand dunes. There were two main conclusions I reached by the end of the day, one was that I really want to be a ranger, and work for conservation/wildlife in Britain, and the other was that my previous 'get rid of humans and let everything go back the way it was' attitude isn't going to work.

Britain is a totally managed landscape, and has been for so long, that we have actually created new habitats around which our species have adapted. For example the heathland, which the CWT are working so hard to restore, is an old china clay site, and the industrial activities there actually maintained the heath. Once the china clay works shut down, the rhododendron set in and was actually starting to take over. It was a similar story at Devichoys wood, when the CWT took it over, it was full of bracken, Japanese knotweed and rhododendron. The ranger we met was a funny mixture of boundless enthusiasm and pessimism - he said that without intervention, pretty much all of Britain would be covered in rhododendron and knotweed. Overall though, he and the other officer we spoke to painted a positive picture, and everyone came away from the day feeling as if the outlook for the environment isn't totally gloomy.

However, on Friday, we had the complete opposite. We had a presentation from a lady from the Marine Conservation Society, who had worked with turtles in Sri Lanka, and seven student presentations relating to conservation issues. After being bombarded with theory all day, everyone was distinctly subdued, as the complexity of conservation, with human nature being what it is, really sank in. I found a good Edmund Burke quote today though on the Paradise Park website: " Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little. "

Maybe that is it, the heart of what conservation is.

Badgers, Birds and Beetles

Just noticed how long it has been since I last posted, shameful, but also a reflection of how busy things are down here. Part of it is because I'm having to do twice the amount of work for everything, to compensate for the lack of scientific background, but most of it is just the sheer volume of work we're doing.

I'll try and summarise what we've been up to. The most exciting thing was doing some bird ringing. I did this in Ukraine, mist netting and watching as the scientist ringed the birds, but I had forgotten how great the buzz is when you're holding these fragile little animals in your hand (and they're doing their best to peck you). This time we weren't allowed to do the extraction from the net, but we were allowed to ring the birds, so I ringed a female blackbird, and a blue tit, which almost drew blood when it attacked me - they're feisty little things. We also ringed a redwing, a couple of firecrests (smallest British bird), chaffinches (which are absolutely beautiful close up), a blackcap, and a woodpecker. The woodpecker was particularly agrieved and drilled some very impressive holes in the ringers fingers. I'm really tempted to do my bird ringing experience now.

I can't remember whether I mentioned before, but I'm angling for a specific project from amongst our list of possibles. The list includes primate study in South Africa, African Grey Parrots in Cameroon, Cowbirds in Canada, Turtles in the Cayman Islands and Management Methods in New Zealand. Of course the one I want to do involves wading birds in Essex. :-) It's to do with a proposal called 'Managed Realignment'. This is where sea wall defences are breached to allow reclaimed agricultural land to become salt marsh again. The project involves driving round 15-20 sites with a tent and monitoring bird use and sampling marine invertebrates. Perfect!

Spare time has been severely limited the last couple of weeks, as I've been researching Tasmanian birds, Ukrainian badgers and now beetles for a report that has to be in tomorrow (hurrah!). I did get to go to Godrevy National Trust beach and look at some seriously fat seals lying about, including a very portly white pup.

We've had lectures on cooperative breeding among long-tailed tits, sexual selection (ie female mate choice and its determining effect on male morphology), and using stable isotopes of Nitrogen, Carbon and Hydrogen to determine bird diet and migration patterns.

All in all, it's unbelievably hard work, but very very interesting. For the first time since I've been here, I am totally convinced that I am in the right place, doing completely the right course. It's a pretty wonderful feeling!

Biodiversity and Trampled Insects

Well, the course has started in earnest now. We have had a couple of Biodiversity lectures, one of which focused on the arguments surrounding why we should care about Biodiversity. I found that quite difficult to listen to, because most people were coming from a really anthropocentric viewpoint, really looking for the benefits to humanity of conserving as many species as possible. Although I can see the validity of doing that when trying to communicate issues to the world at large, I had hoped for something a bit more altruistic and abstract from my fellow students. The discussion ended with whether we should preserve all life, including the smallpox virus. I tend to find myself on the 'too many humans' aspect of that argument!

All in all quite a few of the lectures have been quite gloomy. It's very easy to think that you're doing something incredibly positive by leaving your job and coming to study Conservation, but the reality of the scale of the problem is just overwhelming. I'm sure I'll find a way of rationalising it, but it can be incredibly daunting, and exchanging stories with other students, they feel it too.

Our insect experiment got destroyed by some kids, so we didn't have the fun of identifying indistinguishable spider species this week. It was a shame, but on one level I was quite relieved because I wasn't entirely happy about killing them with antifreeze! I'm really enjoying being here, and just trying to absorb everything I can. The 3 of us who didn't do Science first degrees are feeling the differences a little, so I'm working uncharacteristically hard, and doing extra study is going to be essential.

Still, we've also designed websites, which I found easy, and we're learning things like how to write scientific papers and apply for grants funding. Can't wait for the field trips though...

simone.webber.googlepages.com

Many Cornish Storms

Well since I have got here, it has pretty much been non-stop stormy, so thought the previous title was kind of inappropriate.

I'm starting to settle in now. It has taken a while to get over the totally zoned out feeling that leaving London behind induced. Everything here is so quiet, there's so much space, so few people, meaning that you have more time to think and more space to just be.

Fresher's Week has just ended, which was a bit of a whirlwind of Horns and Haloes parties, Hawaiian barbecues and Seventies Nights, all of which I avoided - still sort of expurging the alcohol from 3 years in the City, and was quite appreciating the sobriety! I did try a sailing taster (very wet and windy and cold), and Capoiera, which was great but has totally killed my legs. For some reason I hadn't expected it to be very energetic, which was woefully wrong. It's amazing to watch though, and it's normally done stood in a circle, with drums beating out a rhythm and people chanting, so quite a unique atmosphere.

We haven't started our course yet, but have been given our first assignment, to write a magazine article on a recent paper of our choice. I'm eyeing up 'The Effects of Chronic Bottom-Trawling on Benthic Biomass' as a possible.

Will update more when I have actually done some work. We have some insect trapping next week for our Biodiversity module I think.