Almost done!

7-30-12

The research is going very well! We completed all 200 random points that I originally generated for the area (technically we skipped two because the GIS layer said there was a road where there really wasn’t so we couldn’t get to them, but we made up for them with some extra opportunistic sampling). We then spent the last two days doing further random samples along other roads that weren’t in the original GIS layer. He currently have done almost 60 of these. We were supposed to finish these in the park today but after completing one training sample we returned to the car, tried to turn it on…and nothing happened. No click, no engine turning, nothing. I popped the hood and took a look but it wasn’t clear what the problem was. Another car drove by and as it pulled up I tried it again and it worked! Praise the Lord! The clock had reset so I assume the battery had fully died but when I talked to Thata about it later he said he didn’t think it was the battery (though he didn’t suggest what else it could be). Not wanting to risk breaking down on the little access road we were supposed to try next we left the park and headed into town. Since then we haven’t had any problems and I really don’t know what the issue was. I wonder if it could be from using the inverter to charge phones, laptops, etc. There have been a bunch of times in the past few days where we turned the car on, drove a short distance (like 200m) while charging, and then turned it off again and then repeated. Maybe that wore things down. This afternoon we didn’t charge anything and we had no more problems. I still do want to collect data on that access road so hopefully tomorrow or Wednesday we’ll be able to do it. I’ll just keep praying for no more car trouble.

In the afternoon we drove to the Chobe Enclave, a set of 5 villages west of the park. We were looking for areas that are human impacted where we can test our methodology to see if it applies to more than just elephants. Yet again, Skiller was a huge help as we talked to chiefs and officials in three villages, requesting permission to collect data in their areas. I suspect I’d have had a much harder time of it without him there. We have permission in two of the villages (the chief was out in one and we’ll have to try talking to him tomorrow) so hopefully starting tomorrow we’ll be collecting some data there.

This all reminds me, I’m not sure I ever described what I’m doing here (if so I apologize but you get to read it again). My dissertation research involves impacts of elephants on large herbivores and vegetation in southern Africa. As a Geography major I am taking a spatial ecology view of this, looking at elephant impacts on spatial distributions of species (the data I collected last year), elephant movement in relation to vegetation impacts (the project we’re starting in Addo), and detecting elephant impacts via satellite remote sensing. This last part is what I’ve been collecting data for these past three weeks. We are gathering information on the status of the vegetation (how impacted it is by elephants) all across the park and are hoping to link that to what we learn from the satellites. A technique called the Moving Standard Deviation Index (MSDI) has been proposed to work for detecting elephant impacts (basically it picks out variable areas in the landscape with the assumption that elephant impacts break up the normal vegetation patterns) but there hasn’t been much work done to validate it. The data I am collecting are designed to assess whether the MSDI really works. If it does I can use it to look at patterns of elephants in space and how that affects how other species use the landscape. I can also use older satellite data to look back in time at how elephant impacts have changed in the park as the elephant population has increased. Even if the MSDI doesn’t work I have been thinking of other ways to use the data I am collecting to get at some of the same issues so it will be useful either way. This has meant far more time staring at plants and far less watching animals than I prefer, but I am excited about what the data may tell us, helping improve elephant management.

7-31-12 Update

This morning we stopped to get fuel and when we tried turning on the car again it wouldn't start, same as yesterday. Fortunately we were at the filling station and the attendant there checked it with us and determined that the battery terminal was loose so after tightening it down (thanks again Uncle Ed for the socket wrench set! We really would be in trouble without it) things worked fine.

We went into the park and finished data collection there. I'll admit part of me is a bit sad about being done working in the park, I like it there a lot. Then again I'm also really excited to be coming back home to my wife and family and friends.

After that we headed back into the Enclave to start data collection there. We only got a few done but we found some other interesting sites so hopefully tomorrow we'll be able to go and finish the work there.

The end is in sight! Praise the Lord!