I’ve talked a bit about some of the skills needed to be a scientist: organization, focus, collaboration, etc.
However, there are some less glamorous skills that I see scientists use often that might surprise you. Here are a few of them:
Poop scooping skills
On Tuesdays, Toolik Field Station hosts a “Talking Shop”, where one of the scientists at Toolik does an hour long presentation about their research and everyone is welcome to attend. It is usually a packed house, since scientists love to keep learning. This past Tuesday, the talk was called “Whale Poop and the Meaning of Life” by Kathleen Hunt, a researcher from the New England Aquarium who learns an incredible amount about the critically endangered Right whale by studying floating whale poop! The talk was pretty fascinating, actually! There is a version of her talk online, if you are interested. http://
I am developing my own poop scooping skills as we clean the cages of our captive squirrels (the ones in the rodent environmental chamber that looks like a refrigerator) daily. Sometimes the squirrels poop in the handling bag, or pee as you are holding the cage. Science is often messy and sometimes a bit smelly! You’ve got to be able to roll with it!
General cleaning skills
We do a fair amount of sweeping (wood shavings, squirrel poo, mud from our boots) and cleaning with sanitizer on Team Squirrel. When we switch squirrels to clean bins, we clean the old ones with a special sanitizer called “Vindicator”. The name sounds like a superhero to me. It kind of makes it more fun to use! It’s important to keep a clean lab and that’s the job of the scientists that use the lab.
Alicia cleans Arctic ground squirrel bins
Lifting/lugging/ hauling skills
Many of the places/species/locations that scientist want to study are not easily accessible by vehicle. To reach squirrel burrows, we have to hike to them, often across wet, squishy, uneven tundra. It doesn't do us any good to hike to them if we don’t have a way to trap squirrels when we get to their burrows. The traps don’t magically transport themselves to the burrows. They get there with the lifting/hauling /schlepping skills of the science team. Scientists are a pretty ingenious group and devise ways to make challenging jobs a bit easier. That’s where a special hauling device called the “Schlepper” comes in. You can carry 12 or more squirrel traps on your back, in addition to whatever you can carry in your hands when you use the Schelpper. That means you can move more traps at once and make fewer treks across the tundra! My record is carrying 22 traps at once. Cory carries 27 like it’s no big deal. He has some pretty fantastic schlepping skills!
Alicia Gillean and Kate Wilsterman carry Arctic ground squirrel traps across the tundra, using the Schelpper on their backs.
Cory and Kate with empty Schleppers
Tool skills
I have been thankful more than once this month that I sometimes retrieve tools for my husband, David, while he works on cars and that I can use basic tools. It seems that scientists build and assemble a fair amount of tools/supplies for their research. During my first few days at Toolik, we assembled a weather station at our research site to help us get additional data for the light collar experiment. This required hauling the parts and tools across the tundra, then using a variety of tools (some in creative ways…) to assemble the coolest weather station ever.
Cory Williams and Alicia Gillean assembling a weather station for the research site at Atigun River.
Cory Williams adding the finishing touches to Team Squirrel’s weather station.
Jeanette and I spent a rainy morning adding new canvas covers to a dozen or so traps, requiring us to use a variety of tools. The canvas covers half of the trap to provide trapped squirrels with protection from sun/wind. Tool skills seem to come in pretty handy for researchers.
Alicia Gillean and Jeanette Moore add canvas covers to Arctic ground squirrel traps
Not required: ability to sit on a bench
One skill that I hope is NOT required is the skill of “safely sitting on a bench”. Yesterday, while sitting outside eating lunch with about 40 other people, I somehow managed to fall off the bench backwards, landing on the deck and flinging my dessert about 10 feet away. I am told that I stuck the landing quite nicely. I wasn’t hurt (aside from my pride) and was able to jump to my feet, laughing, and announce to the crowd (EVERYONE saw it happen), “Apparently that bench doesn’t have a back to it!” We all laughed and continued with lunch (I opted to get a new peanut butter bar and was very careful when I sat back down on the bench again!) So, I would add that most scientists need to have a sense of humor and the ability to laugh at themselves!
What skills would you add to this list?