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Tuesday,July, 24, Steve Roof and I hiked up the valley (in this case "up" is south) to service the "Galcier Cam" and check on the lichen stations. The hike was moderatly up hill over fine rock river plaine, large coarse rocks and then finally over moraines left by the glacier. The pace was brisk and

Observation of Parental Behavior One plot was label for attendance recording. In this area, eleven pairs of parents were successfully caught and marked, along with their nests. One unpaired parent was also caught and labeled, but the partner was never tagged. For the 11 marked nests, at least

Monday’s weather called for rain. This is, after all, Svalbard’s rainy season. We woke to overcast, but no rain. It came eventually but was usually light and manageable. This has been a dry weather pattern around here the past couple of weeks and it interested the team to see how a fresh pulse of

Our weather is still holding out. Periods of heavy drifting fog and some filtered sun today – but only a light wind and no rain. They say that a picture is worth a thousand words…so here are three pictures to tell you what I did today: Misty Nikula digging Unit 2 **Here I am finishing up Unit 2

The babies are growing! Yesterday, Jerome and Ewan continued their chick growth data collection. Chicks would only be gently removed when they were at least five days old. At this point the chick could be removed without disturbing the adult. Some had already lost the egg tooth at the end of their

Sunday, July 22. Having located many of the buoys for the sediment traps Saturday afternoon, we set out to recover the traps on Sunday. This is difficulty work due to the icy water conditions. The boat is out fitted with a boom with pulleys that the rope attached to the traps must be guided too as

So far, so good – the weather appears to be holding out well! We have had no sign of the stormy weather indicated by the Iskatel… Today we spent our first full day working at the site. Right after breakfast, we got packed our day packs with whatever gear we thought that we might need – rain pants

We are collecting data on chick growth. Chicks are measured every 3 days until they fledge about 21-28 days old. The graph below shows mass gain of chicks at Kap Höegh in 2005 and 2006. Little Auks have a linear period of chick growth (between 5-15 days old), and then reach a peak mass at about 19

...it's bird poop! When thousands of birds become startled and soar as a squadron overhead, they leave behind evidence of their flight. On us, around us, on our gear, and in our hair. Ann Harding Ann Harding next to bird blind, showing off her field attire.* It is only one of the side benefits

So last night, after I called in my journal and emailed in my pictures, I got into my sleeping bag and tried to go to sleep. It was quite challenging, because the wind was howling so bad that I could still hear it even with my ear plugs. The worst part, however, was when the wind would blow so hard