ZooBlog

A lecturer invited a friend who’s currently a big name in conservation to give us a chat about working in conservation. His advice for ‘budding conservationists’:

“Well I would say don’t bother trying, but obviously you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t want to try. Maybe you should just do it as a hobby? I don’t enjoy my job.”

Loving my future prospects right now.

Sorry for my recent complete and utter abandonment of my blog! In 20 days (not that I’m counting) my final FINAL university exams will be over and all of my degree work finished! Can’t believe it’s gone so quickly - feels like days ago that I was considering various zoology degrees on UCAS.

Anyway things should really pick up then, because:

1. I’ve borrowed a camera trap from my lecturer (yesyesyesyes)

2. It appears we have a badger visiting my university garden…….

3. I’ve completed my dissertation on Great Tit moult, and will be visiting the ringing group who provided me with the data again for at least one more ringing session.

4. I should be going nightjar ringing and potentially fitting trackers to nightjars at least twice.

5. I’m scheduled to be doing a lot of bee and newt surveys this summer.

6. And generally when given the opportunity I will live outside with my camera and binoculars.

Good luck to any other students sitting exams over the next couple of months! X X X

It finally feels as though spring has arrived in Nottingham this past few days. Last Wednesday I saw my first bee of the year - the big queen bumblebees are out and about at the moment, scouting for new nest sites. Yesterday, from the window of the library, I watched a mallard with her six tiny ducklings swimming about.

Nottingham’s peregrine pair are back on camera, incubating three eggs at the moment. All the birds are upping their singing, trying to win mates and defend territories. Everywhere I go in Nottingham I see little dunnocks singing their hearts out on the roofs of building - they have really rapid, repetitive songs.

Now if only I could ditch the revision and stay outside!

thatssolid asked: Do you remember what the documentary about sharks is called? I would love to check it out :)

Hey! Which documentary - the good one or the bad? I don’t remember the name of either to be honest, but my boyfriend might, I’ll find out :)

I watched a fantastic documentary about sharks and shark behaviour recently - for once, not wholly focused on shark attacks and their threats to people - where some great researchers spent a lot of time studying sharks, swimming with them and learning their behaviour. The narrator’s final words were along the lines of “sharks are one of the most misunderstood animals on Earth, but with the help of research such as this, peoples’ knowledge of and attitudes towards sharks will hopefully improve”.

THEN, immediately afterwards, followed a documentary along the lines of WHEN SHARKS ATTACK!!!! which opened by referring to shark attacks as “a global crisis”.

I hate humans sometimes.

Sir David Attenborough (via psychedelic-physicist)

(Source: imagineatoms, via pixie-sabre)

seasonsolstice asked: would you recommend nottingham for zoology? it does look great, but i'm having real trouble narrowing all these unis down, i just want to do everything! what's your favourite and least favourite part about the course?:)

Hey! I most certainly would recommend it, but I am biased. I know exactly what you mean, looking at different unis and what they have to offer is so daunting. I’m feeling that looking at masters courses right now!

My favourite parts of zoology at Nottingham are:

- The field courses. You have the chance to go to the Peak District and Portugal in your second year. If you do pick Nottingham, GO TO PORTUGAL. It’s the best field course ever. You can also go to Egypt for your final year project which I sort of wish I did now, it’s meant to be beautiful.

- The lecturers are great. It took me a while to get used to them, but they’re really interesting people, and if you show an interest they’ll give you a lot of attention.

- Nottingham teaches the only masters degree in biological (aka wildlife) photography, and you can do a module in photography in your second and third years. I did both. They’re great modules (although I’m not a fan of those lecturers) and it’s a brilliant break from essay writing.

Some of the not so good parts:

- First year modules are not good. In second and third year you have a lot of choice, I picked mostly conservation/ecology/field course modules. First year you HAVE to do microbiology, human physiology and pharmacology, plant science, genes and cellular control… gah. But you first year doesn’t count towards the final mark and this might be the same for other unis. Visit this website to check out the modules: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/ugstudy/courses/biology/bsc-biology.aspx

- Other unis do have field courses too, and from seeing people talking on tumblr I know other unis have great zoology modules too. I wish I’d had more taxonomy-based modules, learning species identification.

- Sometimes I feel that we don’t have as much attention from lecturers and careers advice as I’d like.

- When you do a final year project, you can either independently organise your own or pick a rough category (e.g. ecology and behaviour, parasitology, plants) and the lecturers allocate you a specific topic. The uni organised ones are dreadful, in my opinion. Just really boring. I organised my own and I’m relieved I did.

Yeah that’s everything I can think of in terms of pros and cons… but let me know if you have any more questions, and let me know if you pick Notts! I wouldn’t change my choice to go here :)

x

Beautiful Herald Moth hibernating in a purpose-built bat roost - the tunnel was full of these (but not bats!)

I find it really frustrating when people I know go to Thailand, come back and say to me “You like animals, wait til you see this”, and show me pictures of them bottle feeding leopards cubs, stroking free-roaming tigers in a monastery, riding elephants and holding huge burmese pythons.

That and the fact that the growing illegal wildlife trade is sending poachers from Thailand to Africa in search of rhinos and elephants for ivory, makes me actually never want to visit that part of the world. Being a zoologist is not about wanting to stroke a big cat by any means possible; it’s about wanting to protect and conserve wildlife, in natural habitats.

You only have to see the photos to understand how these animals must be treated. The tigers look lethargic and their coats are dull, with chunks of fur missing. ‘Free roaming’ usually still means chained up too. One girl I know who rode an elephant in Thailand watched its owners use electric prods and bull hooks to control it before she climbed on. It didn’t change her mind, she still rode the elephant. I can’t even imagine where a street vender would get a leopard from, but I doubt it was ethically sourced. And another thing - what happens to the leopard when it prefers meat to milk?

The exploitation of these animals in Thailand and neighbouring countries is appalling, but really it’s only as bad as the tourists who pay for these experiences!

seniorthesisproblems:

The reason for my complete lack of posting. I see I’m losing followers: I redirect everyone to this blog to understand my life right now.

Sorry for the recent abandonment of my blog! My dissertation is due in in less than 3 weeks (definitely not panicking, nope), I’m trying to keep on top of lectures and also attempting to learn 4 software programmes (ArcGIS, MaxEnt, Vortex, Distance) for conservation reports, all of which are completely abstract and RIDICULOUS.

On another note, I went on a bat hibernation survey on Saturday. It was really interesting considering we didn’t see any bats.

I’ll post pictures later.

Favourite books!