Students go to conferences to give talks?

Apparently. And I was under the distinct impression it was to drink entirely too many free pitchers and party grad-student style - all kidding aside, I just got back from OEEC 2009. If there's anything I know about science, it's that it LOVES acronyms.

OEEC is the Ontario Ecology and Ethology Colloquium, which was held at Queens University in Kingston this year. Students from universities from all over Ontario come together to give talks about their research or to show their research proposals. The subjects included sexual selection, climate change, population biology, environmental contamination, animal behaviour... the list goes on.

As with every conference, there were some good and some bad. Some of the interesting talks included one about nest morphologies in the yellow warbler by Vanya Rohwer at Queens University (supervisor: Paul Martin - what an unfortunate name to get stuck with). Yellow warblers make thicker and warmer nests up north than they do further south. He tested the temperature differences in these nests and found the thicker ones (which incorporated feathers and fluffy plant material) to be warmer. The thinner southern nests are more appropriate for warmer, wetter weather, which you find in southern Ontario. Whether they are locally adapted or showing plasticity remains to be seen.

Another interesting talk was about male seismic (vibration) signaling in jumping spiders by Sen Sivalinghem at University of Toronto (supervisor: Maydianne Andrade). I had no idea jumping spiders did mating dances to attract females, nor that they actually vibrated when they did them. First he classified different frequencies of vibrations, from courtship to aggressive courtship to male rivalry. Then he looked at virgin females and mated females and which behaviour the spiders exhibited to them. The males were more likely to make courtship vibrations for virgin females and aggressive courtship vibrations for mated females.

My talk went well. It was titled "Thermal properties of tree cavities in winter and implications for flying squirrels". The fact that I study flying squirrels usually helps take the edge off, and keeps people's attention (at least a little bit). Of course I spent the two days before the conference putting in 12 hour days trying to prep my talk, after assuming that the last talk I gave was "good enough". It didn't take me long to realize that I had to develop some new ways to display data when I looked at some slides that stated findings with no depictions of the results :S

Of course, I hadn't booked time with my supervisor to go over my presentation, and by the time I realized how much work I needed to do, it was Friday afternoon. And I was home. I sent my supervisor several garbled emails (to which he replied he did not understand) looking for stats explanations. Finally I broke down and called the PhD student, nearly begging for help. He walked me through my graphical dilema like a pro and I had a list of steps to create some nice depictions in no time :) Andrea:1 Procrastination: 0

Overall, the conference was interesting and good practice for the CSEE (Canadian Society of Ecology and Evolution) conference in May.

Learning to climb

My research requires both inserting temperature loggers
into cavities and measuring the internal dimensions of cavities. Many of these cavities are out of a ladder's reach, which means we have to climb trees to measure them.

Yes, climb - not the free-climbing of your childhood, when you had not yet realized your own mortailty. This is the safety equipment riddled, muscle aching, uncomfortable climbing of adulthood - complete with spurs, harness, lanyards, helmet and rope.

I was taught to climb by two male students in my lab. Now I am dedicated to equality of the sexes, especially being a female graduate researcher and all, but they just make it look easy. The upper body strength of a rugby player versus my upper body strength (where my workout is carrying groceries home from the store) does not even compare. It's hard work, and I'm glad I did it in the winter (when you can never get too warm and there are no biting flies!).

That aside, it's pretty fun! And getting that high in a tree
offers a great view of the surrounding countryside! Once
you get comfortable and lean back, it's actually quite relaxing
(until you have to start climbing back down).

The scariest part is if you lose your footing. The lanyard and harness are there to slow your fall out of the tree, and turn it into more of a slide, but a very uncomfortable one at that. I know a person with scars going up his stomach from sliding down a large portion of a tree with the lanyard and harness attached.

You try your hardest to get a good footing, and stick the spurs in deep. There's no kicking involved, just stepping straight down on them and letting your body weight do the work. But every now and then a piece of tree flakes off (the piece with your spur in it) or the tree is just too frozen/hard to get your spurs in very deep. That's often when you slip. It's not that I'm afraid of heights, but I certainly am afraid of falling. There were a couple of times last winter that my spur slipped and my heart skipped a couple of beats (and it kinda felt like it left my chest and made a new home in my throat).

All in all, climbing is an interesting and challenging skill to have, and I am glad I learned it. Will I climb just for fun? Probably not... I still get the rugby player to climb "tough" trees for me :)

My Project (the dry stuff)

First things first, what do I research?

I'm looking at two species of flying squirrels (Glaucomys) in Ontario. Southern flying squirrels (G. volans) are moving north with climate change, and that could have impacts on the populations of northern flying squirrels (G. sabrinus) that live further north.

What are my objectives?

I'm interested in the possibility that these two species could be competing for nest trees (cavities) when they live in the same area. As well, southern flying squirrels could be passing a parasite to northern flying squirrels that northerns are not adapted to. Both of these interactions could put negative pressure on northern flying squirrels.

How will I test my objectives?

Nest cavities would be most critical in winter, when temperatures are low. I will record tree cavity temperatures during that time, and model which cavities are warmest using measurements from inside the cavities.

I want to know if southern flying squirrels are nesting in the warmest cavities, so I will also measure known flying squirrels nest cavities to see where they fit in the model. I think that in sites where they are only one species, both northerns and southerns would use the warmest cavities. In areas where there are both species, I think that southerns would use the warmest cavities (they have been shown to be more aggresive than northerns in defending nest boxes).

I will also test both species for the parasite Strongyloides robustus. It lives in the intestine and has no measureable effect on southerns, but causes harm to northerns. To test for the parasite, I will collect scat samples on a north-south gradient in Ontario, to see if it is moving north with southerns.

So that's the gist of it - my Coles Notes version :) Now onto the interesting part, field work - the good, the bad, and the ugly... stay tuned