Happy holidays & Update from Peterborough

Happy holidays to everyone!  I returned to Peterborough last Wednesday to stay at a friend's house to take care of her pets while she's away for Christmas break.  The wifi access is limited at her place, so I walked to school almost everyday (with the dog) to use internet.  I am still taking photos everyday, but uploading them won't happen immediately, hence there are a lot of photos in this (and upcoming) posts spanning several days.

A festive photo from Ottawa two Sundays ago.

Walked around the neighbourhood

The weather wasn't too great this weekend, so I mostly stayed at home and tried to get some work done.  I took a bit of a break this afternoon and walked around the part of my neighbourhood that is currently being build.

The pond from the other side.

Honey Island Swamp Tour in Louisiana

On my second day in New Orleans (July 28), my lab-mate and I signed up for a swamp tour at Honey Island Swamp near Slidell, i.e., a chance to see American alligators (Alligator mississippiensis) in the "wild".

American alligator is endemic to southeastern US and is the official state reptile of Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi.  It and the Chinese alligator are the only two living species in the genus Alligator.  Alligators belong to the family Alligatoridae, and crocodiles belong to the family Crocodylidae (and both families belong to the reptilian order Crocodylia).  They are real "living dinosaurs" because their lineage goes back to about 240 million years ago, and they are still surviving and thriving in the present (way beyond the extinct dinosaurs).

One common question from most people is what are the differences between alligators and crocodiles.  Basically, alligators have a wider snout and expose only the upper jaw teeth when the mouth is closed.  Meanwhile, crocodiles have a long and narrow snout, and upper and lower teeth are both exposed when the mouth is closed.

To get to Slidell from New Orleans, we drove across Lake Pontchartrain on the Causeway which is the second longest bridge in the world.  Pretty awesome.

Nunaluk Spit, northernmost point of mainland Yukon

Two days ago, the inner tube of the back bike tire completely blew out when I was on my way to the trail.

 While walking back home with the broken bike, I manged to get a few photos of a bumblebee visiting someone's Moonflowers.

I bought a replacement this morning.  Hopefully I will be back biking tomorrow.  But for now, here's what happened on one of the days during my field season.

On June 23, 2012, I had the rare opportunity to travel to the northernmost point of mainland Yukon called Nunaluk Spit, it is basically a gravel bar that extended along the coast and the Beaufort Sea.

On the spit is a cabin built by the descendants of the famous Arctic explorer, Vilhjalmur Stefansson.

Rock-climbing on a rock-flipping day

Today I went rock-climbing for the first time in my life. It has always been something I wanted to try two years ago but never really had a chance, and whenever I stared up on a rock surface or a tall tree, I always have the urges to reach up and pull myself up. Well, I finally did it today at Trent's rock-climbing wall. I went through the orientation of how to tie the knots when climbing, as well as how to belay climbers. Now I just need to find a partner to go regularly to fulfill my desires of leaving the surface of the earth and move upwards.

Speaking of rocks, today is also rock-flipping day. I remembered it when I got back from the gym and so I decided to just flip rocks around where I live.

Trent University's Kerr House.

Wordless Thursday - Herons and Summertime in Richmond

More from Inuvik, NWT

Went out for a walk yesterday morning before heading to Parks Canada office. The neighborhood we were placed in. Not exactly superb, but it's interesting (and safe).

Okay, hopefully this will be a quick post as I need to finish off some paperwork and go to bed soon.

I think the one thing that I will decrease/cut from my "non-working" days is not visit all the blogs that I have on the right side of my blog, which is a shame because they are all fantastic places for knowledge, inspiration, and humour. Nevertheless, it can sometimes take up an hour or two reading them every morning, so I might just pick ones I find interesting.

Now onto today. Today was my first day coming to Trent University. First thought, it is more culturally diverse than I thought, not that I am complaining, but I was not expecting it to be similar to UBC in terms of the diversity of students. Second thought, it's small (again comparing it to UBC). Third thought, the people are extremely nice and helpful! I had to walked around the campus asking for assistance and help and everyone were just incredibly nice! I like nice people, so I think I will like this school. Four thought, I know this is a (student) job, but today felt like a job than being a student - running around getting equipments, meetings with supervisors and fellow grad students, etc. I think I will get used to it.

Now, some photos from Trent. Today's a cloudy day so forgive me if the pictures are gray or the sky is whitewashed.

The sports field. Apparently we are called the Trent Excalibur. Not sure how it fits, but it's pretty unique.

Making up for the cloudy days...

I totally forgot what I did for the last four days now. This is what happened when it's cloudy and I ended up staying indoors most of the times.

Well, I better make up for the missing days by going outside to enjoy this beautiful Friday.

Blue sky and white puffy clouds.

Birding at Finn Slough - Bird of the day: TUVU

Another bike ride to Finn Slough to get the much-needed exercise/birding.

Along the way, I saw lots of Mew Gulls and other gulls circling around in the sky.

Many Golden-crowned Sparrow feeding.

Flock of Coots, Ho Ho Ho House and Moon watch

I had quite a busy afternoon today. First up, biking to the dyke.

Nice weather today.

Resting heron.

Hello from Ontario!

Hello everyone! I am currently sitting in a cafe about 1 hr drive from where I work/live using internet.

So far, the place has just been amazing! I get to see a new lifer almost everyday and the people are just fantastic to work with! I look forward to spending the next 4-5 months working with them and living in this special place.

I will need to keep things short and simple as I am relying on my laptop battery, but you may click on each Flickr photo for more description.

This is where I am currently living, before we fix and clean our field house and the surrounding captive cages for the coming shrikes.

Wordless Wednesday - Taking a break on a beautiful blue day

Larger image here.

Herons finding and catching prey

Once again the terrible weather has not arrive yet (I am dreading it). But at least I can enjoy another dry but gray day.

The Bald Eagle was at home when I rode by.

Almost got a straight face-on passport shot like this one. So funny! I think I scared this heron and it flew away when I was photographing it. Sorry.