Day 22

So those of you who have been following my summer adventures know that we are due for a new blog today (since I am so very faithful to writing one every-other day).

The Jeep tire has been replaced and, even though it took two hours at the shop (everyone and everything moves a bit slower here in Wise), we were back in business yesterday. Today we had a really productive day- birding this morning and then we did 4 habitat points, for a total of 16 vegetation plots. Pretty good.

Funny story- Lupita is getting very good at identifying the birds and plants/trees we see, even though she's not familiar with them being from Mexico. Today, she was helping to measure some trees and usually if she is unsure, she brings a leaf sample to Chris or me. So she shows us a leaf sample while standing next to the tree she pulled it from and wants to know what it is. Our answer was, "Well the tree is a dogwood, but the leaves you are holding are poison ivy!" She couldn't believe that is was really poisonous, but we assured her that if she didn't wash her hands soon, she would be very sorry she touched that plant.

Not much else is new really- today we saw a yellow-billed cuckoo up close which was pretty cool. They look like they belong in the tropics or something. More of the same tomorrow- but June is here! Only 6 more weeks of intensive stuff before I can catch a break:)

Some views from "my office". These were taken at the top of a mountain of rocks with a 78% slope. Always a good time climbing at 6am. The sunrises are great though, I hope to catch a good one on camera soon!

Day 20

Six ticks and a flat tire. This is today's story.

Well we had a couple of days off last weekend since I got to go back to NJ for my friend Lisa's wedding for a day, which was a nice visit even though it was way too short. Anyway, today was back to work. And we were tired. Really tired.

We had a pretty good day in the field overall, its really started to get hot here. Today it was over 90 degrees by noon, so we were REALLY hot out there. Birds surveys went pretty well and we did more habitat sampling on 10 year old reclaimed mine site. I took a neat picture of a hardened track in the mud (along with my gps unit for scale, its about 5 in. long). We actually think this is a cat track, probably a bobcat, since there are no claws visible. The larger mammals really must get around on that site- we see scat and prints everywhere (bear and coyote, mostly). Luckily, we haven't run into any aggressive ones yet!

So we're getting ready to leave and there is this extremely steep and rocky road that we have to climb. Seriously, its about 2000 feet elevation done in maybe less than a quarter of a mile- its crazy steep. So we get to the top and I take off the 4-wheel drive since we're on a regular gravel road (we've done this many times before). Anyway, we drive a little ways down the road, and pop! there goes the tire. Good thing Chris and Lupita were expert tire changers. They changed the tire (in record time I might add) and I supervised (and took pictures). Luckily since we are using a rental car, the cost of the new tire is covered, but we have to wait until tomorrow morning to get it done. So my schedule for the rest of the week is all messed up since we won't be out early enough tomorrow to survey birds. It's always something.

Chris and Lupita working on the flat tire on the dirt road in the middle of nowhere.

Speaking of pain in the butt- the ticks were really bad today! I had tons of spray on my clothes and still had to pull six ticks out of me when we got back!! Nasty little buggers. Not one of the nicer parts of the Great Outdoors.

Day 16

Well, we've been here about 2 weeks now. Things have been busy, I think the project is progressing along. We're expected to be finished bird surveys by mid-July since that is the typical end of the breeding season, but salamander surveys can be done into the fall, so I'll be making some weekend trips down here in the late summer and fall. The habitat data collection is also going well- I have around 100 points, each of which has 4 associated habitat plots that take about 15-30 minutes to count trees, shrubs, grass species, etc. It's a lot of work, I guess that's really what we spend most of our time doing. Everyone hates doing habitat stuff, but we all joke about it to make it a little bit easier (Lupita's new one is "No trees, no shrubs, no problems!" after Kenny Chesney's song "No shirt, no shoes, no problems.")

This morning while doing bird surveys we found a nestling Carolina chickadee on the road. He was really cold and almost dead when we found him, so Lupita carried him around for a bit to warm him up. Then he seemed to perk up once he got warm, he was eating pieces of apple from us (we even fed him the ticks we pulled off us!). He seemed to be doing ok, but when we got him back to the house, he kinda just got quiet and died. I'm assuming the mother bird probably pushed him out of the nest when she realized something was wrong with him. The unfortunate truth in the bird world.

"Chicky" the Tickeater.

Tomorrow we will again do a bird survey in the morning at the site closer to Wise (we get very excited about this because we can sleep til 5am and still get there by 6). This time I'm remembering my camera to take a picture of the sunrise!

Day 14

Well today was interesting! We decided to take a day off from birding and focus on some habitat data collection. Yay for sleeping in until 7am today! This morning we ran into a bobcat in one of the forested areas adjacent to the mined areas we are working on. We were walking down the road and I guess we startled him and he ran away from us and back into the forest. I wish I was quick enough to snap a picture, but by the time I recognized him and thought about it, he was gone. That's a pretty lucky sighting since bobcats are very elusive.

We also had our first poisionous snake experience (see first black bear encounter in earlier blog). We approached plot 24 to take some habitat data. Its really brushy and full of thorny stuff. We were sort of making our own path through the vegetation and I spotted him right next to where we were walking! It was funny because Chris must have walked right by him and didn't see him! He was a copperhead, and I've never seen one with such a bright colored head. So needless to say, we decided to survey plot 24 another time! Of course we didn't leave until I could snap a few pictures!

Day 12

Well today was an early morning! No bear sightings this time though. I think we were all dragging a little bit this morning (being that it was Monday and we were coming off of a relaxing weekend...and the fact that we had to leave the house by 4:30am). Today we sampled some pastureland and did some habitat plots (I was proud that we did 20 of them, even though there weren't any trees to count).

Saturday we decided to take a day off, and I took a ride to Breaks Interstate Park. It's one of only two state parks in the U.S. that has shared management and involvement between multiple states. So Breaks is right on the border of Virginia and Kentucky, about an hour north from where I am staying. But it was certainly worth the ride! The views were spectacular and it was a clear and beautiful day. I even got some recreational birding in, where I wasn't constantly counting individuals and estimating how far away they were from me.

Yesterday we spent a half-day laying out more artificial habitat coverboards for salamanders. The boards aren't too big, but they are rough-sawn timber so they're pretty heavy, and its hard to carry them up hills and over rocks. We did pretty well setting them up too! Things have been moving along!

The weather predictions for this week are good, so chances are we're in for some good birding!

You're looking at Kentucky!

Now you're looking at Virginia!

Pictures!

The field house on the campus of UVa-Wise in Wise, Virginia.

The faithful Jeep Liberty.

A black rat snake we found on the road.

The male bear at Wildcat reclaimed mine site.

A fuzzy view of him through my binoculars.

Day 9

Well today we had our first inevitable black bear encounter (and second, and third?). This is our story.

So we left the house at 4:30 to get on the site to start birding at 6am. We stopped the jeep on the road and walked about 100 yards up a forested hill to the first bird sampling point. When we came back to the car about 10 minutes later, there was a pretty decent sized male bear in the road ahead. I think we startled him a bit, and he ran a bit, then turned and looked at us. He ended up just sauntering away, deciding that we weren't too menacing.

So what about the second encounter? Well...Lupita and I dropped Chris off at his first sampling point and continued driving down the road. Little did we know a large momma bear and two cubs were right over the slope of the hill where we dropped him off (we literally drove right by them!). Chris said he was nervous about being between the cubs and mother, but it turns out they all took off when they saw him.

And third? Well kinda. Lupita and I drove down the road to our next point, and who do we see? Mr. male bear again munching on some greenery not too far from our first plot. We must have caught him earlier on his trip out of the forest and into the reclaimed mine. They really must like all the vegetation and berries they can find there, and obviously we're likely to run into them since we're there at dawn when they are active. He didn't seem to mind us there though, we got out of the car and were looking at him and obviously making some noise, but he continued eating away. I kept an eye on him while Lupita did the bird survey to make sure he didn't come over and surprise us!

So today was bear day (although we did see alot of birds too!). Tomorrow will be our first day off since we've been down here. Not sure what I'll end up doing, hopefully something fun and also getting some much needed sleep.

I did get some pics of the bear for those of you who are wondering! I am working on setting up the high speed internet, then hopefully I can post them!

Day 7

Well, yesterday we got up and did another round of bird surveys. The best part was hearing a barred owl! Lupita and I heard it at our first point around 6:10am, and it was unmistakable (really close too). Then we had to take a trip up to Blacksburg (a 3 hour drive) to pick up the coverboards for part of the salamander study. What a pain! So we drove 3 hours to pick up 100 boards that barely fit in the Jeep with us and to meet with my advisor who says "add more points, survey 400 habitat plots on top of wildlife surveys, blah blah blah". Even more work, yay. I did get to stop at my apartment for 20 minutes and pick up some things I forgot and to bring my car down here with me.

Today we decided we were all too tired to get up and go birding at our site that is 1.5 hours away. Instead we started laying out some salamander coverboards and working some habitat plots at the closer site (only 20 minutes from Wise). Good thing we did through because we got a rain storm about 2pm. We got soaked since we wanted to finish the plot before we left!

So tomorrow we'll have to go survey the other site for birds and lay out more coverboards. That means we are leaving the house at 4:30 am tomorrow morning. So I better get to planning tomorrow's schedule and get to bed!

Sorry about the lack of pictures, I hope once we get high-speed internet at the house I can upload some.

Day 5

So today was our first day of sampling. When I say sampling, I mean we go to points that I have selected previously because of their cover type or age, and we look and listen for birds. The hardest part is moving between sites (and of course remembering all the bird songs!). So overall, today went pretty well. We were all dragging when we woke up this morning. It's certainly hard to be functional at 5am! We saw quite a few birds and were only unable to identify a few. We also saw some huge bear poop! Hope we don't run into that guy any time soon. This afternoon we did some vegetation data collection on some plots in the areas we sampled. We see what kinds of trees and shrubs are there and what the cover is like on each site. It takes some time to get good at it, but we did pretty well.

So tomorrow we'll go out for birds again tomorrow. Then we need to head back to Blacksburg and pick up some coverboards that weren't ready when I left last week. Coverboards are rough-sawn pieces of wood that provide artifical cover for salamanders (and typically make them a bit easier to find).

More to come later!

Day 3

Hello friends-

I apologize that I haven't written sooner- we are still without internet at our field house! We're all pretty bummed since we wanted to stay in touch with many people (but hopefully it will be hooked up soon?). So for those of you who don't know, I should fill you in about what I'm doing. Here it is in a nutshell:

I am living in Wise, Virginia (10 miles from the eastern Kentucky border) and working on two sites that have formerly (and are currently) being mined for coal. I have two assistants working with me from Virginia Tech- Lupita, another graduate student from Mexico, and Chris a wildlife undergraduate student. Basically I will spend this summer and next summer looking at wildlife communities on these sites after they have been through the required reclamation process under law. We will be looking at different types of reclamation type (e.g., forestland vs. grassland), age since reclamation, and vegetation cover composition and structure. Now for the wildlife part- we'll be sampling birds, salamanders, and frogs on most of these sites to find out what species are there and how many.

So that's it. Sounds easy, right? haha. I dare you to get up at 4am everyday to be out on the sites at sunrise to count birds. Or to memorize a hundred or so common bird songs. Or to stumble around in the dark while it's pouring rain searching for salamanders. So wildlife research isn't for the faint of hearted. Not a surprise.

I really hate ticks! I've rarely ever found one on me, but myself and my field assistants have been pulling them off us left and right. The areas where we work are very rocky with tall grass, perfect for little buggers like ticks and poisonous snakes! Fun stuff.

Our field house isn't too bad at all. We are staying on the campus of the University of Virginia's College at Wise, a smaller satelite campus of the larger UVa. The house is close to campus, has 3 bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, and a nice yard (it's supposed to have internet!). I also am using a vehicle from Enterprise as our field vehicle (since VT didn't have any 4-wheel drive available). So we got a 2007 Jeep Liberty- really nice! I feel badly that we have to get it so dirty and put so many miles on it. She'll be well broken in when we turn her back in August.

So the past few days have been spent getting settled in the house, marking out plots for sampling, and practicing our birding skills together. We will get to start officially sampling in a day or two! Unfortunately, the birds don't get many days off, so neither do we! Busy busy busy.

Things have been really stressful (since apparently, I am the one in charge?), but it's going alright thusfar. Well, I will write more later- I'm having some trouble posting pictures, but I'll try to get some up soon. Peace-