So, I haven't posted in a while, so I thought I'd give some updates on what's going on in my life.
Firstly, classes have ended, and I got good grades, so double yay! I can now concentrate entirely on my research until August. Speaking of research, I'm working with my first set of sticky pitfall traps, so that's pretty neat. I've hit some wrinkles, but that's all part of the process.
I have also started 'oil pulling' in the mornings, on a whim. It is a dental health craze, but I thought I'd give it a go and see if it did anything to the coffee stains on my teeth. I've been doing it for about a week now, and no significant results, but I'll give it more time before I judge.
Today I went to Barkshed Recreation Center in Arkansas with some other grad students. The others were collecting leaf litter for Berlese funnels, and I was just there to get some hiking in. As we drove in, we discovered that the GPS couldn't pronounce 'Barkshed' which was pretty funny. We had a license to go trailblazing, so instead of walking along trails we were walking through a forest, which consisted mainly of many slopes. It was a really intense hiking experience, and we saw a lot of cool wildlife. Firstly, there were a TON of large, charasmatic swallowtail butterflies as we drove in. We also saw a slimy salamander, a grey tree frog, another type of frog, and some aquatic salamander juveniles. For arthropods, we saw an enormous scarab beetle larva, some cool looking millipedes, bunches of spiders (including a large mature widow of some sort, with yellow markings on its back), termites, and ants. We also briefly saw a jumping spider that mimics an ant, which was super awesome! I'm sure we saw more things, but I'm super tired, so I'm going to wrap it up. I had an awesome time!
