Submitted by Anonymous on Tue, 04/16/2013 - 19:51
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Carbon Balance in Warming and Drying Tundra 2013

Dear Tom Lane,

I was wondering how long it would take to shovel out the snow if there were 12 people digging out the snow? Were there any animals that interfered with the project? How many feet of fences were there? What do you think the wind rate was while you were doing the project? Did something happen to your tools because of the weather condition? I am very interested in this topic and hope you write more about it.

From, Emily Baumgartner

Tue, 04/16/2013 - 22:31

Tom Lane

Thanks Emily for the excellent questions.-We had about 9 people working per day. If we had 3 more people working we could maybe finish in 3 days instead of 4...provided we had the snowmachines available to transport them to the CiPEHR site and sleds and shovels for moving snow.
-In the winter, I don't think there is much of a concern regarding animal interference. Caribou move through the area and some have been sighted at times on the research area. Moose are in the area but I don't think any have been seen at the site. Wolf may be in the area. Occasionally you see tracks but none have been seen at the site. In the summer there is a concern regarding grizzly bears and researchers carry bear spray. I have seen grizzly bears in the Healy area when I taught at Anderson School north of Healy in 1990-91.
-There are about 150 feet of fences. Fifty feet at each sample plot.
-There always seems to be a breeze at the research site. It's usually 1-3 knots on the Beaufort Wind Scale. One day during shovel week it was probably more like 10 knots...it was cold!
-The only "tools" really affected by the weather are the laptop computers we collect data with. When it is cold, I mean really cold -30F or so, the batteries don't last long before running out of charge. Sometimes the snowmachines are hard to start, but that is generally an issue with good maintenance. The plastic tubing connections in cold weather seem to develop more leaks so trouble shooting problems becomes more frequent.