Hello again!
The webinar on terrestrial research in Svalbard is getting closer, and I’m currently working
on the talk I will give. Since I’m not a scientist who has been working with reindeer for a very
long time, I will try to focus on letting the listeners know about my contribution to the larger
project BIG (Bjørndalen Integrated Gradients). These months here on Svalbard I have,
together with Oline, been on weekly field trips counting the reindeer in Bjørndalen, and we
will use these data to get a better understanding of the spatial ecology of the Svalbard
reindeer. As well as counting, we are also looking at the snow depth where they are foraging
as well as measuring snow depth in different transects throughout the valley. These weeks
has been great, and I’m looking forward to learn how I can communicate my research and
experiences in a way to catch peoples interest.
In addition to the planning of the webinar I’m also slowly starting to work with data
management where I will make registered observation facility information available in the
Observation Facility Catalogue. In this catalogue it is possible to search for given parameters
and their location, which makes the use of existing research infrastructure better. I think
this will be a good experience for the future, learning how to make data accessible for a
research community and have a look at what kind of infrastructure that can be utilized.
I still work within different communication tasks, and I’m now currently making the SIOS
newsletter of May. This is the first time doing this, so I’m looking at old newsletter to get an
idea of how they usually look like. I’m also trying to imagine how I would want a newsletter
to look like for it to catch my interest.
This semester has flown by so fast, and with the warmer days, melting snow and midnight
sun, I can feel that the semester is coming to an end. Even though this internship hasn’t
been all about biology, I have really enjoyed trying out the working life, and exploring what
kind of job it is possible to get in the future.
Maren
