So, recently my days have consisted of poking trees with a broomstick in search of lizards. In case that sounds glamorous let me dissuade you, it’s actually been a ton of work and for the most part the lizards are little flashes of four legs and a tail. Chasing them down to sex them just … More The Field
In the tradition of my ecology forebears, especially Wallace, every once in a while I get a chance to collect and pin cool insects. I am thinking of extending my research project to also look at primary consumers (things that eat plants), and especially, grasshoppers along with a few other grass-dwelling predators, such as this … More Insect Pinning
Hello everyone, Sorry it’s been so long. Last I wrote I was still learning to drive the car. After all this time you must have thought I’d driven it into an elephant or some such. Well, it’s been nothing quite so catastrophic, I’ve simply been working day in, day out every day of the week … More What have I been up to?
Today was a long day out in the field. I completed three transects in the morning and early afternoon, working until 4:00 when I ran out of wire for the tree tags. (don’t worry I’ve found some more and will be back at it tomorrow). But because the day ended a little earlier than I … More Sweet Sixteen
So I’ve now spent three days out in the field collecting data for my masters thesis. The field work is exhausting. The sun is scorching hot and the work is pretty repetitive but it feels good to be out and about working and actually making progress. I’m sorry I haven’t written a nice, concise description … More Science in progress
Just to prove that all’s well here’s a new picture. It’s about 1 month into my plan to neither shave nor cut my hair (ie embrace my inner neanderthal) and I can say with new authority a beard is definitely not for me. The plan from the beginning was to see how ridiculously long my … More Beard Chronicles – Chapter 1.
Hello everyone, Sorry for the long delay! I’ve been extremely busy and I haven’t really been spending very much time near my computer so I haven’t updated you in a while. Monday was my first real day out in the field and while I didn’t actually spend it working on my project it was an … More First day out in the field
My first gecko in the hand! Found by Kayla crawling on the wall in the library. After a brief chase behind a filing cabinet I managed to catch him and take a couple of pictures. It’s nice to finally catch, hold and admire a reptile here! I’ve seen exactly two other lizards but have yet … More Herpetofauna!
Hostage: one Suzuki from Nanyuki Ransom: The money we already paid So it turns out that our not being able to test drive the suzuki that we rented has really come back to bite us. We paid quite a large amount of money for the car above, and had it driven to us here at … More Ransom
I got up and out early this morning to go recover some small mammal traps with one of Mpala’s researchers Jake Goheen. I was awake at 5:30, before the sunrise, and wandering around in the cool pre-dawn african morning. I really love mornings here. It’s extremely clear and today at least was so bright I … More Rodent Trapping
Colin Donihue 